Torrijos seems annoyed by the courts

At a July 15 ceremony in which he handed 100 families the keys to their new homes in a Chepo public housing development, President Martín Torrijos expressed his frustration with "a justice system that in many cases doesn't work."

He didn't single out any case in particular, but in answer to the questions of reporters invited to the event, he referred to debts that the government owes from several high profile court decisions. Some of these would be the recent high court ruling in favor of a cigar company whose assets were sequestered by Supreme Court order in a tax fraud case, an old Inter-American Human Rights Commission decision awarding damages and back pay to workers of the old state-owned IRHE electric utility who were fired for going on strike in 1990 and a $32 million ruling in favor of a French company that was stripped of the contract to build a new Colon bus terminal, which was then given to a consortium led by the Arnulfista governor of Colon at the time.

"I don't change the court. I can only nominate the magistrates," the president said, "but I add to the voices of those who proclaim their concern."

One of the more recent concerns is a ruling by the Supreme Court's Third Bench --- the three-magistrate panel that deals with appeals of public entities' administrative decisions --- that canceled a debt of some $2 million owed to the Interoceanic Regional Authority (ARI) by Jean Figali, proprietor of the Figali Convention Center, a member of Mireya Moscoso's circle of intimate friends and a friend of the Third Bench's presiding magistrate, Winston Spadafora. In addition to the concerns about apparent partiality that are so commonplace that they are hardly ever the subject of public comment anymore, in this case Administrative Prosecutor Óscar Ceville pointed out that ARI never passed any administrative ruling or resolution concerning Figali's debt and thus it would appear that Spadafora and his administrative bench lacked jurisdiction to hear his friend's complaint about the debt he owes the authority in the first place.

Answering a question about departing US Ambassador Linda Watt's contention that Panama still has a lot to do in the fight against corruption, Torrijos said that "We're doing our part and I hope that we will all have the will to confront the problem of corruption."

However, polls and pundits indicate that a lot of Panamanians aren't taking the president's anti-corruption statements at face value.

In a Dichter & Neira poll conducted for and published by La Prensa, 66.4 percent of those surveyed opined that corruption had not diminished during the Torrijos administration. That same poll said that the same percentage believed that changes must be made in the Cabinet, with those advocating changes listing Government and Justice Minister Héctor Alemán as the one minister who the most think ought to go.

In a front-page "Hoy por hoy" editorial, La Prensa said that "President Torrijos admitted his frustration with the administration of justice, but said 'nothing can be done.' We don't don't understand why, then, he waged his recent campaign for the presidency on the promise of 'zero corruption.'" The editorial went on to criticize Torrijos for his response to the Catholic Church's demand for the resignation of all Supreme Court magistrates by the appointment of "a futile judicial reform commission," opining that there are ample grounds for the National Assembly to impeach the magistrates.

But some of the most specious of the high court's pro-corruption rulings have inured to the benefit of PRD members. The quashing of the investigation of bribery allegations against members of the previous legislature in relation to the CEMIS affair and the more recent cancellation of legal actions against former President Ernesto Pérez Balladares and, among others, President Torrijos's cousin and aide Hugo Torrijos are two examples of this.

In the president's defense, former Vice-President Ricardo Arias Calderón, the spiritual leader of the PRD-allied Partido Popular, writing in his weekly El Panama America column, noted that Torrijos has made the government more transparent, has appointed commissions that will recommend substantial reforms, did well in his nomination of respected jurist Esmeralda de Troitiño to the high court and has taken actions to deal with the corruption of past administrations and avoid its repetition in his own. "He has made a good start to the fight against corruption by way of influence peddling and conflicts of interest," Arias Calderón added.

In the Moscoso-Torrijos constitutional reforms, passed by the outgoing and incoming legislatures last year, the power of the assembly and president to vary the number of magistrates on the Supreme Court that had previously been presumed was specifically provided. Thus there is an "atom bomb" in the PRD's arsenal, whereby the court's current discredited majority could be turned into a powerless minority by an increase in the number of its magistrates.

But even then, Torrijos might plead weakness and respect for the concept of separation of powers, as if he were not both the president of the republic and the leader of the Democratic Revolutionary Party. The contrast between the PRD leader's "hands off" approach to legislators of his own party and what might be done is currently being highlighted by the tiny Partido Liberal Nacional, which is in the process of expelling Kuna Yala legislator Rogelio Alba, who was caught smuggling liquor and cigarettes out of the Colon Free Zone without paying duty and who is caught up in an emerging scandal over the abuses of the legislative tax exoneration for imported cars, from its ranks.

The president is clearly hampered by the fact that he works within a political culture in which corruption has long been taken for granted and in which people who surround him apparently expect political patronage, nepotism and opportunities for illicit income as the rightful fruits of their electoral victory. So far it seems that most Panamanians, while they don't believe that the "zero corruption" pledge has been kept, are willing to believe that it's a matter of Torrijos having limited powers or limited audacity rather than his own personal corruption. This provides him with an opportunity to win points with the public by following his expressions of frustration sooner rather than later with bold actions against corruption in the judicial and legislative branches, but also poses the danger that people will presume him a crook if he allows the current situation to continue as it has for much longer.

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