On the evening
of June 3 and into the wee hours of the next day, Panama’s
substantial Dominican community danced to merengue to celebrate
the selection of Miss Dominican Republic, 18-year-old dancer
Amelia Vega, as Miss Universe. Panama’s queen, Stefanie De
Roux, finished in a five-way tie for 11th place in the beauty
contest, which was held at the new Figali Convention Center at
the former Fort Amador.
Finishing behind
Vega as first runner-up was Miss Venezuela Mariángel
Ruiz, followed by Miss South Africa Cindy Nell, Miss Serbia
& Montenegro Sanja Popic and Miss Japan Miyako Miyazaki.
As bad as
Panama’s economy may be, this country is still seen as a
land of opportunity for many Dominicans. The Panamanian and
Dominican dialects of Spanish are similar and there have been
close trade and cultural ties between the two countries since at
least the beginning of the Spanish colonial era. According to a
spokesman for the Dominican Consulate in Panama City, there are
about 20,000 Dominicans now living in Panama. Within minutes of
the Vega’s selection as Miss Universe, merengue music was
heard and Dominican flags were displayed on Via Brasil and
Avenida Central and in working class neighborhoods around
Panama.
The morning
after, Panama’s schools, which had been closed to stem
student protests during the pageant, were open again and the
country got back to business as usual. It will be some time
before the true economic balance of hosting the Miss Universe
pageant is known.
The Panamanian
government paid a $9 million subsidy to pageant owner Donald
Trump, plus fielded a police cordon of some 1,500 officers for
about two weeks to protect the beauty queens from terrorists,
Lotharios and journalists. The government’s IPAT tourism
agency estimates that 6,000 people came to Panama for the event,
probably not enough to recoup the government’s investment
through hotel, restaurant and airline taxes alone. However,
during the pageant hundreds of millions of television viewers
around the world got several flattering glimpses of Panama and
that surely represents future income for the nation’s
tourism industry. Add to that presently intangible gain a lot of
temporary jobs and the new entertainment and convention venue
that was more or less finished in time for the pageant.
The week before
the pageant there were somewhat violent demonstrations that
closed some of Panama’s main traffic arteries. It was a
matter of burning tires and mattresses in the street, exchanges
of stones and tear gas grenades and annoying traffic jams,
followed by the closure of the University of Panama and Panama
City's public schools for several days. There were no deaths or
serious injuries and only a few arrests, but the University of
Panama's rector is threatening expulsions.
Adding to
economic setbacks caused by street chaos, government workers
were given half of June 3 off. That's a productivity loss that
will be hard to quantify but amounts to an offset against any
gains the country realized from the pageant.
On the afternoon
of June 3 the National Movement for the Defense of Sovereignty
(MONADESO), a leftist umbrella group, held a peaceful march
through Panama City, led by “Miss Corruption,”
“Miss Eternal Debt,” “Miss Impunity,”
“Miss Unemployment,” “Miss Inequality” and
“Miss Poverty.” It seems that favorite of the mostly-
brown crowd of some 2,000 students and labor union members was
the blonde --- Miss Corruption.
Panamanian
leftists were not the only ones using the pageant to make
political statements. On the NBC network broadcast that was seen
around the world, the outgoing Miss Universe, Panamanian Justine
Pasek, was shown entertaining US troops in the Middle East
(despite overwhelming if sedate opposition to the Iraq War
indicated by opinion polls in this country). Several of the
queens were interviewed at the Palacio de las Garzas, in which
they exalted Panama for having a female president (with no
mention being made that she’s widely regarded as a failure
here). President Mireya Moscoso and Commerce and Industry
Minister Joaquín Jácome were pointed out in the
audience by NBC. In the Panamanian pre-pageant show on RPC
television, IPAT director Liriola Pitti was featured and claimed
a big success for the Moscoso administration. Also briefly
interviewed on that broadcast was Ricardo Martinelli, the former
canal affairs minister and dark horse Cambio Democratico
presidential candidate.
Also in this
section:
Panama News Briefs
Venezuelan Embassy presents
the other side of the story
Horror on the way to
Houston
Torrijos runs cautious
campaign
Miss Universe
2003
Instability in
Ecuador
