opinion

Justice without democracy?

by Miguel Antonio Bernal

In the face of a deteriorating situation in our country, it's unavoidable to make reference to certain political concepts, especially the concept of democracy, which, as you know, ever more depends on the multiple cultural, political and socio-economic realities that exist in a society. Here I recall that Aristotle classified the pure forms of government at monarchy, aristocracy and democracy and the impure ones as tyranny, oligarchy and demogogy.

We start from the fact that the credibility of the political institutions has plummeted and due to this the public conscience has been been battered insistently and with impunity by irresponsible and corrupt governments. While political morality should have found its bases in legality, in efficiency, in responsibility, in honesty and in impartiality, unfortunately it hasn't turned out that way.

The sage teachings of José Dolores Moscote, who said “A prepared and vigilant attitude among the people, although at times it falls in to manifest errors, is always uncontestably better for a country than a passive and indifferent attitude that leaves the field to the mercy of dictators and tyrants,” appear to have been misplaced if one looks at the way citizens behave.

For us in our times to be able to talk about a democratic state and of the rule of law, sine qua non prerequisites are that human rights are in legal effect and respected; that individual and social guarantees are respected by those in power; that there is a periodic renewal of leadership in all of the institutions; that there is real and effective political representation by those most capable to assume public functions; that there's a legal demarcation of the functions and attributes of the offices of government institutions; that there is due and permanent respect for the human rights conventions, the constitution and the laws that emanate from them; and that there's a real and permanent possibility of holding public officials accountable when, by their conduct, they infringe fundamental freedoms or legal norms.

We all see how in our Panama the use of the concept of democracy has an ever more demagogic tinge, at every level. This is no political discourse that doesn't take recourse to this very old concept and everything indicates that some people are convinced that constant repetition is their life's calling --- but not so the strengthening among the citizenry of the elements that define it and which, since the remote epochs of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution, have been accepted by peoples who seek the happiness and power of living under the rule of law.

I must underline that democracy doesn't work in our country and won't work so long as it doesn't have among its pillars of support and motives for its development not only a proper constitutional environment, but also an absolute, profound and real reform of the state to deal with the realities that there is in effect no respect for individual and social guarantees, nor is there any permanent and unconditional respect for the vote, nor is there any adequate equilibrium among the public powers without one branch being subordinated to another.

Elected officials wouldn't have to have constitutional or procedural immunity if they were elected because they were the most capable, if their politics weren't top-down, if they were truly committed to their jobs, if they advocated the public interest, if honesty and efficiency were the rules and not the exceptions.

Democracy will work if the laws are effectively applied  to those who don't conduct themselves according to its parameters, without regard to their social position or influence, in order to keep the country from remaining as spoils for a few; if its public acts are carried out as functions of democratic institutions within a supreme constitutional order and in their real and effective application put the public interest and society's welfare before oligarchic interests and the personal welfare of those who are obliged to serve the country.

These days democracy must have among its principal foundations the jurisdictional and administrative control over public servants, whatever their rank or level in the hierarchy; and the will of these officials to effectively act against those who are incapable because they can't or won't comply with the laws that regulate their public activities. Here in Panama we have completely lost the view that the first public responsibility of an honest government official is to respect and apply the law.

The citizens can't become the police of corrupt elected officials or public servants, even if we legally had the right and the means to denounce cases of public corruption. However, it's particularly impossible for citizens to complain about infractions or crimes by officials of the highest levels, even though their commission may be flagrant. The risk of incurring civil or penal responsibility is very high because of the lack of access to the means of proof, not to mention the retaliatory acts of the most powerful people in politics, society and the economy.