travel

On November 20 some 1,300 passengers from the Celebrity Cruise Line’s Summit, most of them German nationals, were prevented from leaving the Colon 2000 cruiser port. The tour buses in which they had planned to visit various attractions in Panama were stranded by a blockade organized by drivers from the Servicio Especial de Turismo, who operate under a concession in the name of Logistic Tours, which in turn is owned by one Gilberto Soto.

It was an escalation of a long-standing dispute that weaves together charges and counter-charges of monopolistic practices, racism, gangsterism, domination of Colon by outsiders and disrespect for the law. The net result of the incident is that Panama’s reputation as a stable and friendly place for tourists has been put into question.

The gist of the dispute from the protesters’ side was that the tour operators hired buses from Panama, Cocle and Veraguas, but not Colon. They had a law requiring buses that work out of Colon to possess Colon permits on their side, because the blocked-in buses lacked these.

Thus the argument took on the colors of a long-standing complaint by Colon residents that in jobs and contracts the economically depressed province with a predominantly black population suffers systematic discrimination.

Some of the province’s major employers, like the Manzanillo International Terminal port, actually give preference to Colon residents when hiring. But there are also notorious Colon businesses that bus in all their employees from Panama City, and this reporter has often heard employers' comments about how in Colon it’s difficult or impossible to find job applicants who are willing and able to work. It’s a complicated issue in which racism, the cultural habits of a community that has long suffered from chronic unemployment and a province whose schools and other public institutions have historically been shortchanged all play their parts.

Not all Colon residents supported the protest. One Colon tour operator, who asked not to be identified, opined that the dispute ought to be fought out in court rather than by actions that inconvenience tourists and harm Colon’s reputation. Without addressing the bus permit issue, this entrepreneur noted that the blockade was illegal, and to him, intolerable.

The dispute was brought up earlier this year at the AMCHAM tourism forum, and then, as in the wake of Colon 2000 blockade, people in the tourism industry argued that they have nothing against using buses and drivers from Colon but they do object to a monopoly in favor of one group that has local permits. Many of the expected complaints about monopolies --- inferior services in badly maintained and unclean buses, offered by people with no incentive to deliver quality because they have no competition --- have been and are being raised about the Colon bus permit requirement. The words “mafia,” “extortion” and “gangsters” are frequently used by tour operators when they complain about demands that only those with Colon permits be allowed to transport people from Colon cruiser ports.

The protest prompted government sponsored talks between Colon bus drivers and Colon 2000, which appear to have been inconclusive. However, in the various daily newspapers and on Panamanian television all the Torrijos administration officials who commented about the situation agreed with the Colon 2000 management and most tour operators that protests like the November 20 blockade harm Panama’s reputation and national economy and should not be repeated. One measure of the intentions of people on both sides of the argument is that one logical and legal exit from the impasse would be for more Colon tourist bus permits to be issued --- but such a move, which would at the same time be anti-monopolistic and reserve for Colon its share of the nation’s tourism revenue, seems to be something that neither Colon 2000 nor Logistic Tours have in mind.

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