opinion

"What's going on? What's the problem?"

The officer did not respond. Seconds before he had looked me up on the screen, had ordered me to put my left index finger first, and then the right, into the box to take the fingerprints, had taken my photograph with the little round camera, had stamped some seals, but, however --- wasn't giving me my passport back. He got up from his chair and without saying a word to me, signaled me to follow him. He gave my passport to a representative of American Airlines and said "you know." She, in turn, passed it to another employee to verify on her screen, on which is showed that the flight had arrived, when it did, and if, in fact, the boarding pass that was inside the passport was not false and if I had a reservation to take this flight to Panama, this same day, three hours later.

"What's the problem?" I asked.

The officer did not respond. That is to say, without understanding why, nor knowing why, this man ended up turning men into a person without a right to any explanation.

"Would you please let me know what's going in?"

Mute. My discomfort was changing to annoyance --- great annoyance. Then, the airline employee just said "follow me" and walked far enough ahead of me so as not to have to answer my questions. I followed her until arriving at a dark windowed office with hidden cameras, replete with passengers, with immigration personnel who were verifying passports against their Dell flat screens.

Ten minutes later, an officer swarthy officer, with notable Hindu features and a Muslim name, asked me without any courtesy, in a cold and striking way, the purpose of my visit to the United States.

"Oh no! You are mistaken!" Looking her directly in the eye and also in a cold voice, I responded that I would not attempt to visit the United States. If she would check, I was in transit to go to my country, Panama, on the American Airlines flight. She looked at her screen, examined the boarding pass and began to flip through the pages of my passport. Confused, bothered, and now not looking me in the eye, she ordered me to sit down.

This past November 23 I left by way of Miami to Bilbao, Spain, invited --- for the second time --- in my position as the executive director of the Latin American Journalism Center (CELAP, by its Spanish initials), to the sessions on journalism, development and communications organized by the Sustained Development Foundation (FUNDESO), a non-governmental development organization, apolitical, independent and founded in 1995. As on the prior occasion, journalism students attended these sessions and Spanish professors from the University of Navarre, Madrid Autonomous University and the University of the Basque Country participated as expositors. On this occasion there were two foreign invitees: activist Rosa María Alfaro Moreno, of Peru's CALANDRIA Social Communicators' Association, and me.

As I went via Miami, I returned on the same airline and by the same way. It's ever more disagreeable to travel by a US airline, and the customs of that country make it much more intolerable. Exhausted, after nine hours from Madrid to Miami, the last thing one might desire is that somebody in US Customs would have the audacity to think that the thing that one does, such as journalism, is a terrorist profession!

Sitting, I observed how the customs official reviewed each page of my stamped passport --- I've traveled much in the last five years. He stopped to read all the visas that appeared in it and haltingly read the information that showed up on his black Dell monitor. What was he looking for? What information --- which I don't know --- is maintained in the database that the screen shows, and which motivated the first officer to send me to him? Would it be that my recent trips to Beijing, Hong Kong, Bangkok, Bali, Kuala Lampur and Prague surprised him?

After 35 minutes passed I was called. Without saying a word, without any explanation and without the least courtesy of any kind, my passport was given to me.

"What happened with my passport?" I asked.

"Nothing, it was only checked against the list."

"Why? Is there something wrong with my visa?"

"No, it's valid."

"Of course it's valid! Would you be so kind as to explain to me what the problem is?"

"Nothing. You can go now."

And then? The country that has been demanding equality and respect for its citizens from others doesn't apply that rule in its territory! What information in my passport bothered them? Did it merit them questioning, investigating, retaining --- without any apparent motive --- but without giving any explanation? What kind of treatment is this? Furious, I asked "Where do you get it that I'm an unhappy Panamanian citizen whose greatest yearning would be to live or work in the United States?" With a frigid look, I took my passport.

Seated on the airplane, I began to write this article. Can Panamanians treat US citizens the same way? Would our government dare to demand a history of every American who lands in our territory, taking the prints of their left and right index fingers, photographing them and maintaining a database of all their professional and personal activities? Would Panamanian Immigration dare to hold any American, whoever it is, without any explanation? How many decent Panamanians, and citizens of other parts of the world are treated disrespectfully in US Customs, while corrupt politicians, drug traffickers and white collar criminals mock their system?

But I'd like them to tell me. Who do they think they are?


The author is director of the Latin American Journalism Center (CELAP)



Also in this section:
Cuervo de Paredes, Who do they think they are?
Leis, Our Social Security Fund
Lerner, God and the tsunami
Human Rights Watch, Bush must answer about torture
Boxer, Why I must object
McIntosh, Guatemala: the region's drug smuggling hub
Goodman-Campbell, Honduras upholds the banana republic tradition
Sea Turtle Restoration Project, Swordfish off restaurant menus
Bernal, Perspectives
Jackson, Panama's bizarre land use policies

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