High court blocks presidential secret fund probe

Panama’s Supreme Court, by a 5-4 party line vote, has blocked Electoral Prosecutor Gerardo Solís’s probe into whether the Moscoso administration illegally used the presidential secret fund to support Mireyista candidates in the recent election campaign. The court’s five Moscoso appointees did this by granting an amparo --- a hearing of a constitutional challenge coupled with an injunction against further action while the case is pending --- requested by Minister of the Presidency Mirna Pittí. Before the election Solís had advised that he would be coming by the ministry on May 11 to inspect its records.

The ruling is legally controversial, as prior to the Mireyistas taking control the high court had declined to hear constitutional challenges to electoral cases until they had run their course before the Electoral Tribunal. The Panamanian constitution gives the Electoral Tribunal exclusive jurisdiction over electoral cases, but once Mireya gained control of the court it grabbed control over the Electoral Tribunal’s consideration of the PRD’s move to oust legislator Carlos Afú --- who was accused of taking a bribe to approve the president’s Supreme Court nominees --- and sitting on the case long enough for the Mireyistas to maintain control over the legislature for the balance of Moscoso’s term. The swing votes by which the Afú matter was taken up by the high court came from magistrates whose positions on the court were allegedly procured by bribing Afú.

(Afú was re-elected on May 2 as an Arnulfista, and one of the matters that Solís is investigating is whether money from the presidential secret fund was used to promote Afú’s candidacy.)

The blockage on the secret fund investigation came despite warnings from the Electoral Tribunal that the Supreme Court should not interfere in its affairs. There is no higher tribunal with the explicit power to decide disputes between the Supreme Court and the Electoral Tribunal, which are considered constitutional equals in their respective jurisdictional spheres. The present ruling could thus be the stuff of which a constitutional crisis is made. However, once Mireya is out of office the PRD will have both the presidency and the votes in the Legislative Assembly to break the impasse by reorganizing the court system.

The number of magistrates on the high court is set by law rather than the constitution, such that the next government, which if it does nothing would work its entire term with a five-member Mireyista Supreme Court majority, could add two or more magistrates to the court and sweep away the last important vestige of Mireya Moscoso’s political power. At the end of the Pérez Balladares administration the outgoing PRD president and legislature attempted to retain control of the court by creating a “Fifth Bench” staffed by Toro’s appointees, but the next legislature repealed that legislation and thus ended that brief court-packing scheme.

The presidential secret fund investigation is but one of several electoral corruption cases in which President Moscoso and her followers are being challenged by the electoral prosecutor. Solís is impugning the re-election of Darien legislator Haydée Milanés de Lay and the victory of Herrera legislator-elect Pacifico Escalona on the grounds that their campaigns were supported by massive infusions of public funds, and may act in other cases.

There are also several other vote buying allegations that are under investigation but about which Solís is not impugning any election results because the money allegedly paid to buy votes was from private rather than public sources. However, some losing candidates in those races may challenge the results.

The nightmare scenario might arise from San Miguelito, where Arnulfista Francisco Alemán’s supporters are alleged to have passed out up to 10,000 $10 food coupons in exchange for votes. But San Miguelito is a massive multi-member legislative circuit, whose complicated results were not declared until several days after the election. An impugnation of Alemán might thus affect the fates of several other candidates and would be difficult to adjust without a rerun of the entire San Miguelito legislative election.

The alleged electoral corruption cases are veiled in mystery not only because the presidential secret fund and its uses are secret, but also because there are no legal requirements for the disclosure of private campaign contributions in Panama. Couched in terms of protecting political donors from official retaliation, the secret private financing of political campaigns is one of the cornerstones of Panamanian public corruption.

Also in this section:
Panama News Briefs
PRD sweeps back into office
Posada Carriles gets eight years
Law students stand up for their professor
Scenes from the big Torrijos rally
Gangs: the lethal urge to belong
Bleming closes the circle
Alabama rape suspect's Chiriqui real estate career cut short
Supreme Court blocks presidential secret fund investigation

news

High court blocks secret fund investigation