news

Also in this section:
ACP disavows its consultants' studies, nixes independent environmental review
PRD group keeps Endara from speaking
On the referendum campaign trail
Panama News Briefs

On the campaign trail...

An endorsement Torrijos did not get: La Prensa and El Panama America, having been misinformed by the Ministry of Foreign Relations, reported that the "yes" campaign had won the endorsement of the recent summit of Non-Aligned Nations. Actually, all they got was a generic statement by Hugo Chávez about how important the Panama Canal is to Latin America and the inclusion in the final resolution of a recognition that this country's assumption of control over the canal at the end of 1999 was an advance for the anti-colonial struggles of our time. Neither La Prensa nor El Panama America, nor the foreign minister for that matter, have seen fit to correct the false campaign endorsement claim. Photo by the Presidencia

333 campaign groups registered

The folks at the Tribunal Electoral tried to bar the doors a half-hour before the closing time, prompting a shouting and shoving match with "no" supporters, but when it all was over and the registration period had run, there were 333 campaign groups registered for the October 22 canal expansion referendum. There are 267 on the "yes" side and 66 for the "no" campaign. In reality there are about a half-dozen important and distinct factions on either side. For the "yes" side there are the PRD, the Panama Canal Authority and various business groups of consequence. On the "no" side there are labor unions, leftist groups, rank-and-file Panameñistas, environmentalists, a couple of former presidents and some retired top canal officials.

Competing for the women's vote

There are a couple of major women's committees on the "no" side and one on the "yes" side. In favor there is a group largely composed of the wives of politicians and business leaders, whose titular head is former Miss Universe Justine Pasek. On the "no" side one group comes out of the Panameñista Party and is led by former legislator Gloria Young and another arises from the Liberation Theology section of the Catholic Church and brings together nuns and women from the various community organizations with which groups like CARITAS have worked for many years.

"No" side picks its spokespeople

The various "no" campaigns have met to coordinate their actions and choose their official representatives with the Electoral Tribunal. The top spokesperson for the canal expansion plan opponents will be the radical priest Conrado Sanjur, and his alternates will be former legislator Gloria Young and sociology professor Olmedo Beluche.

"Yes" side coordinates its activities

The "yes" side is in fact led by President Martín Torrijos and Panama Canal administrator Alberto Alemán Zubieta, but for purposes of dealing with the Electoral Tribunal all the different factions are led by businessman Felipe Rodríguez. The "yes" campaign appears to be more tightly united than the "no" forces.

         PRD symbols in the "no" campaign? Actually, nobody should be surprised.

         After all, the first prominent critics of the canal expansion plan to be voted

         up or down on October 22 had PRD roots --- former President Jorge Illueca

         and former Panama Canal administrator Fernando Manfredo. Here a group

         of PRD dissidents from Chiriqui registered with the Electoral Tribunal as an

         official "no" campaign committee. Photo by FRENADESO

The specter of...?

One of the big arguments made by the "yes" campaign, which has the support of all of the mainstream corporate news media, is that if the Torrijos - Alemán Zubieta Plan is not approved on October 22, competitors will immediately move in and take business away from the Panama Canal. It is true that the canal has competitors, and will probably have more as time goes by. But sometimes arguments get stretched a bit far, as in a September 5 story in La Estrella, which warned that El Salvador is about to move ahead with a "dry canal" project; and a September 11 story in El Panama America about how Colombia is considering an interoceanic canal through its territory. Hmmmm --- doesn't the map show that El Salvador has a Pacific coast but no territory on the Caribbean Sea? And wouldn't any Colombian canal have to pass through jungles and mountains that are not only in an earthquake prone zone, but also largely controlled by the leftist FARC guerrillas?

Oops!

One notorious feature of the ongoing campaign is the massive use of public funds to promote the "yes" vote, which is likely to have repercussions for many years to come. But it's done under the supposition that a message from the Panama Canal Authority that if the proposal doesn't pass Panama is in big trouble, or a message from the president that the "no" side are thugs trying to wreck this country are examples of the use of public funds to "educate the people" about the Torrijos - Alemán Zubieta Plan because they don't actually say "vote yes." But the mayor of Calobre? He may have pushed the envelope a bit far. Acting on a tip, people from the Electoral Tribunal caught Mayor José Cirilo Díaz using a city car to campaign for the "yes" side and he is facing an investigation that could lead to a criminal charge.

Monsignior: canal expansion won't cure poverty

For the most part Panama's Catholic hierarchy is for the canal expansion plan and the Liberation Theology Catholics are against it. But those lines are not sharply drawn, as there are church people on both sides from all levels. Monsignior José Luis Lacunza has not made an endorsement, but at a September 9  event in Chiriqui he told President Torrijos that Panama's real problem is that "it's a country of the rich in which many poor people live" and that, unlike the promises that are being made, the canal expansion project will not eliminate poverty here.

Government promises to train 200,000

The master plan for the canal expansion project says that at the height of its activity, about 6,000 people will be employed. Nevertheless, in the "yes" campaign's propaganda they're promising 250,000 jobs in this country of about 3 million inhabitants. Now INADEH, one of the government's several jobs training agencies, says it will provide job training for 200,000 people, it says for the canal expansion project.