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On the occasion of The Day of The Martyrs

Manifesto to the country

by the Torrijista Democratic Front

It’s the forty-second anniversary of the glorious feat of January 9, 1964, the date on which studious youth in particular and the people in general sacrificed their lives on the altar of the fatherland, to give a start to the effective struggle for the total abrogation of the Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty and the elimination of the colonial enclave known as the “Canal Zone.” And, one year after the first declaration of the Torrijista Democratic Front, it’s suitable to engage in a profound reflection about the historical dimension of some unfortunate events and a political balance of what has happened in the country over the past 365 days.

Generational mountain climbing

Since the dawn of the republic that was born cut in half by virtue of the US colonial enclave and of the political control of the state by a minority “political caste” better known as the liberal oligarchy, society set forth on a historic pilgrimage of national dignity until it was able to accomplish, at noon on December 31 of 1999 --- after almost 100 years of popular struggle --- the Third National Independence. Along this long march of the popular sectors and of their most noble detachment, the Panamanian youth, have made manifest, on different occasions, the clear political will of men and women to stand up, to confront and defeat the anti-national and anti-popular model binomial policies of the national oligarchy and American imperialism.

The “Patria Nueva” model

As we had warned from the start of the government of the PRD-Partido Popular alliance (“Nuevo Gobierno ¿fin del torrijismo?” in La Prensa, September 20, 2004): “In the bosom of the party founded by Omar… you can’t forget that with the Manichean argument of modernizing the party, in recent years the hierarchical and unipersonal leadership accelerated the process of deideologization and detorrijization of the PRD.”

Concepts like that were reiterated in the Declaration of the Torrijista Democratic Front, published this past January 9 of 2005. Among other things we said that “the PRD is a party that emerged from the combative traditions of the Panamanian people… and was shaped by the actions and thoughts of the leader of the national liberation process and founder of the PRD, General Omar Torrijos. It must never cease to be a permanent political organization of a revolutionary, democratic, nationalist, multi-class, popular, unitary, grass roots, independent and principled character. However… the party of Omar is today a structure of the neoliberal cut, of bosses, ward heelers and political patronage; in which yesterday’s Torrijista style of political debate and of consultation has been replaced by a unipersonal leadership and by a policy --- if you can call it that --- of surprises and secrecy.”

Currently there can be no doubt that the hierarchy of the authoritarian and autocratic “Patria Nueva” regime has embraced, body and soul, the the model of social exclusion, social Darwinism, and political manipulation and control.

Casino economy

“The economy is flying,” is the fashionable phrase of the neoliberal technocrats of the PRD-PP alliance, a slogan shared as well by the ignoramuses, converts and political ideologues at the top of the PRD. It’s true that the growth of the Panamanian economy in recent years has been elevated, 7.6 percent in 2004 and 6 percent in 2005. However, we must say that this increase in the Gross National Product hasn’t been able to “permeate” the lowest strata of civil society which, in general, the men and women on the street occupy. The factor implicit in this phenomenon is the fact that our country occupies third place for worst distribution of wealth among the nations of the continent, surpassed only by Haiti and Brazil. Neither can we ignore the reality that the economy’s expansive cycle is beginning to show signs of exhaustion. In addition to the above the figures publicized by the governmental bureaucrats serve, in one form or another, to arouse popular suspicion. This is for two basic reasons: for the incoherence of some and the falsification of others.

For example, how can you accept the version of the Ministry of Economy and Finance dated December 21, 2005, which appears on the institution’s website, in which, without presenting the numerical values of the modified investment budget* and the amount of the committed budget, it categorically affirms that: “With regard to the 2005 budget, in the area of investments its execution reached 80 percent, the best level in the last 20 years.” There are reasonable doubts about this claim, above all if you know that as of September 30, 2005 the government had only executed 48 percent of the investment budget.

Worse yet, with the zeal to conceal the generalized conception that the head of the neoliberal gang has turned the republic into an immense gambling den and the nation’s productive forces into a “casino economy,” they now take recourse to the open and shameless falsification of their own set of statistics, for example in a report that appeared on the web page of the MEF’s Gaming Control Board dated August 18, 2005 and entitled Report on Gambling 2003 vs 2004, which explains that in the year 2003 $1,014,665,70 was bet on type “A” slot machines, a sum that represents 86.7 percent of all bets. In the same report it comments that in 2004 the total wagers in this form of gambling were $2,407,632,392, or 92.6 percent of the total gambling bets.

However, on the same web page of this ministry, something that increases our perception and conviction that there is a great deal of corruption within the government: the report on wagers by the owners/operators of class “A” slot machines dated January 3, 2006, was adulterated and we have the right to supposed that the results for 2005 will also be manipulated. Now it turns out that in the years 2003 and 2004, the Panamanian and foreign gamblers only turned  the wheels to the tune of $265,124,058 and $342,920,305 respectively. The game ends in the art of statistical juggling, by which in two years a trifling $2.8134 billion disappears over two years. And what else? God only knows.

Power to the Torrijistas!

The final phase is underway --- “second generation structural reforms” on an anti-national (Panama-US Free Trade Agreement and the expansion of the Panama Canal) and anti-popular (“modernization” of the state) model are the political epitome of the strategic alliance between the neoliberal oligarchy composed of the bureaucratic “Patria Nueva” bourgeoisie and the financial bourgeoisie. The scenario is complemented by the government’s unconditional alignment with the designs of the US administration presided over by the genocidal George W. Bush.

The rigorous examination of the political accumulation objectively and irrefutably demonstrates that the grade of social and political maturity reached by the so-called “popular movement” still doesn’t permit it to turn into a real alternative for power. The task of carrying this out belongs, at this point, to the Torrijistas. Thus Torrijismo as a political force has the principal mission of defeating the neoliberal current in the PRD. It’s a proposal to pass through the sieve of a national project, energized by a broad democratic and popular alliance that’s capable of moving --- in its diversity --- the people’s unity to build a participatory democracy.

For a popular democracy!

Glory to the Martyrs of January 9!

* Editor’s note: When they refer to the  “investment budget,” they refer to what US public finance wonks usually call the  “capital improvement budget,” that is, the “brick and mortar” budget for public works, rather than the general operating fund for regular  government functions.