An act that could be of great historical importance may soon be consummated. Last year the Inter-American Human Rights Commission, an international court sitting in San Jose, Costa Rica, whose decisions Panama is bound by treaty obligations to respect, held in favor of workers for the former IRHE electric company who were fired for striking in 1990. The workers for the state-owned utility (which has since been privatized) lost their jobs pursuant to Law 25, which was passed by a Legislative Assembly that was dominated by the Christian Democrats at the time and signed by President Guillermo Endara. Now, nearly 12 years after the firings and many months after the workers won their case in court, the Cabinet Council is considering a recommendation by the National Economic Council to pay the judgment.

The big question is how much, with the former employees claiming back pay and benefits amounting to some $80 million and the Moscoso administration thinking in terms far smaller than that. Economy and Finance Minister Norberto Delgado declined to specify the amount that he thinks the government must pay to the 270 fired workers. He said that he presumed that the money would come from the government's funds.

The Ministry of Labor was put in charge of estimating the compensation owed to each individual worker for the government, while independent accountants for the fired workers came up with a total figure that ranges between $70 to $80 million.

Manrique Mejía, the fired workers' representative, told The Panama News that he was glad that the government has adopted a different attitude and begun to consider ways to pay the pending bill. "We hope that they maintain their celerity in order to keep up with the schedule and actually pay." According to Vice-Minister Eduardo Quiroz, "the government has three options to finance the settlement --- issuing bonds, an installment plan or dipping into state coffers.

The Cabinet has been considering a payment of only $10 million, but Mejía said that the workers' figures are correct, that they have a right to somewhere between $70 and $80 million, and they won't accept anything less after their 12-year legal battle. "This judgment is a precedent for all the Americas," he said, "and it can serve as a new path for other unions to take when they are confronted with unjustified firings. Part of our satisfaction is that we have unmasked the government of the time, in which all three branches connived to fire workers and union leaders.

Mejía added that 11 of the fired workers died while the legal action was pending, most of them impoverished and leaving their families in debt. "The process that has taken us this far in the courts, in which we have faced trial after trial, isn't over yet because the bureaucratic red tape is still causing great harm," he said.

"It's also important to say to Panamanians, and to the international community, that as of February 14, 2002, the Panamanian government has been in open contempt of the court's judgment, which carries with it a penalty for the delay," Mejía added.

Mejía acknowledged that the nation's Ombudsman played an important role in the process. A representative of that office attended the proceedings in Costa Rica, and the commission designated the Ombudsman as the supervisor for the government's payments to the fired workers.

The IRHE workers may have been the ones who won their lawsuit first, but a number of other government employees who were fired under Law 25 --- people who walked off the job at the Port Authority, the old INTEL phone utility, the Ministry of Public Works, the former INRENARE environmental agency, the now-private Cemento Bayano, the Ministry of Education and the IDAAN water and sewer utility --- are also covered by the commission's precedent.

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