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High school riots
US State Department's take on human trafficking in Panama

Costa Rica dumps Taiwan for China

Rice doesn't much impress the OAS
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Panama News Briefs

PTJ inspector busted for selling guns to crooks

The investigation is said to have begun when police seized a 9-millimeter pistol that was allegedly used in crime. Strangely enough, records showed that the weapon was already in law enforcement custody, with the Judicial Technical Police (PTJ). Audits were done, surveillance was conducted, and eventually the head of the PTJ ballistics lab, Inspector Luis Alberto Ramírez Vargas, and three other persons were charged with taking four AK-47 assault rifles, four shotguns, eight pistols and nine revolvers from the PTJ, in this case allegedly to sell to Colombians for use in their country's civil conflicts. Some of the daily newspapers have reported that El Chorrillo gangs were able to buy automatic weapons from the PTJ for $500 each. There is an ongoing investigation and may be more arrests in this latest law enforcement scandal. Attorney General Ana Matilde Gómez has reprimanded acting PTJ director Gustavo Barragán for promoting Ramírez while the missing guns investigation was underway.

PTJ reform process extended

As the end of this legislative session approaches without time to take up the controversial matter of law enforcement reorganization, the National Assembly has extended through December the special measures giving Attorney General Ana Matilde Gómez effective control over the Judicial Technical Police while the legislative and executive branches figure out whether and how to reorganize or abolish the institution. The Torrijos administration has proposed to largely abolish the PTJ by merging it into the National Police, but there has been a lot of resistance to that idea, which would strengthen the political controls over the nation's law enforcement and make political corruption even harder to investigate and prosecute. The extension of the special period also blocks former PTJ director  Jaime Jácome in his attempts to have the courts reinstate at least for the rest of this year.

Poisoned medicine exhumations stalled

Because of shortages in budgets and staff, the process of exhuming and testing the bodies of those suspected to have died of diethylene glycol poisoning has been stalled. Meanwhile, new claims of deaths or illnesses caused by the poisonous cough syrup distributed last year by the government keep coming in, many of them from remote rural areas. Officially, 101 people have died. Prosecutors are investigating claims that likely put the death toll at well over 300.

Archbishop slams government, student rioters

In a Father's Day homily delivered at a mass celebrated with 15,000 of the faithful at Gimnasio Roberto Duran, Catholic Archbishop José Dimas Cedeño criticized the government for inequities and injustices, singling out the poisoned medicines scandal and the sale of public lands to public officials and relatives of the president at very low prices as examples of government abuses while at the same time there is little action to deal with stagnant wages, growing poverty and an increasing cost of living. The archbishop also lamented a general decline in people's values and singled out the recent violent demonstrations by high school students as one example of that.

Six-year-old dies from scorpion sting

On June 11 six-year-old Carlos Pérez was stung by a scorpion in his home in the El Valle area community of La Mesa and taken to the health clinic in El Valle. The clinic had a scorpion sting antidote on hand, but the doctor on duty thought it inappropriate to use in this boy's case, gave him other medication to treat the symptoms and sent him in an ambulance to the hospital in Anton. By this time the child was having breathing difficulties and getting oxygen in the ambulance --- until the oxygen equipment broke down. Pérez got to Anton in poor shape, was given a scorpion sting antidote and sent on to Seguro Social's pediatric hospital in Panama City, where he died the following morning. It seems that this death may not have been due to an especially venomous scorpion, but to the boy's unusually severe reaction to the sting.

Ancient graves in Coco del Mar

A family in Coco del Mar, adjacent to the ruins of Panama Viejo, decided to build an addition to their house but wanted to do it right, not destroying any possible historical or archaeological sites. So what did archaeologist Carlos Fitzgerald find? Pre-Columbian tombs estimated by the style of pottery found to be from around 900 to 1000 AD --- yet one more proof that Pedrarias the Cruel didn't really found Panama City as the standard claim goes, but merely seized an already ancient town from the people he found living there. The skeletal remains of four individuals are well enough preserved that it is hoped that DNA can be extracted from it to gather clues about the origins and present-day relatives of the people who lived in the capital 1000 years ago.

Cambio Democratico moves to oust deputy

The Panamanian Constitution says quite clearly that a legislator who abandons his or her political party or even breaks discipline by voting in what the party on whose ticket he or she was elected considers the "wrong way" can be removed from office by that party. The last time that was done was in 1994, when PRD deputy Mario Miller was thrown out of his party and the legislature after being busted for extortion, a charge for which he was later convicted and imprisoned. The several attempts since then by parties to expel wayward members have failed, as the courts have delayed action on endless appeals until after new elections made the questions moot. Now Juvenal Martínez, who was elected to the National Assembly on supermarket baron Ricardo Martinelli's Cambio Democratico party, has quit that outfit and joined the PRD. But if Martinelli has his way, the PRD caucus's gain will be ephemeral, as Cambio Democratico has moved to revoke Martínez's mandate and replace him with his suplente, loyal Cambio Democratico member Noriel Castillo. And the last guy to be thrown out of the legislature by his own party? Mario Miller is a Cambio Democratico member these days.

Three-way race for Union Patriotica leadership

On the opposition side of this country's politics we have seen over the past year a merger of rabiblanco liberal factions into the Union Patriotica. That new party was the formal merger of the Solidaridad and Liberal Nacional parties, and then a lot of MOLIRENA activists left that ailing organization to join the new party. Now there is the first contest for the Union Patriotica presidency and there is a three-way race, with former Vice President Guillermo Ford (ex-MOLIRENA), Aníbal Galindo (ex-Liberal Nacional) and José Raúl Mulino (ex-Solidaridad) hoping to head the new party. It's expected that in 2009 the Union Patriotica will be part of an anti-PRD alliance, but who will lead that alliance and on what terms is still very much in the air. There is talk of having an inter-party opposition presidential primary, and more speculation that, whatever the process, most or all of the opposition will support the opposition figure who's doing best in the polls as the 2009 campaign approaches. At this point polls suggest that businessman Ricardo Martinelli is the most popular possible opposition presidential candidate, followed by former President Guillermo Endara.

PRD tops half-million

In a recent recruiting drive the ruling Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) signed up more than 50,000 new members, bringing its total membership to just over 500,000. That represents just less than one-third of the total Panamanian electorate.

High court won't give Liborio García his job back

The selection process for a permanent replacement for former national ombudsman (Defensor del Pueblo) Liborio García will not be disrupted by any surprise legal rulings. Shortly after his appointment last year García, who got into trouble over an alleged act of domestic violence and some very intemperate public declarations about the subject, was removed on the pretext of political activity for participating in a legislator's food fair. He was temporarily replaced by his suplente, Mónica Pérez, who is now one of several people seeking the permanent appointment by the legislature for the remainder of García's five-year term.

Are you a NIMBY if it's a river instead of your yard?

Because the Panamanian tradition is that the richest and most powerful get to build whatever they want wherever they want it, we have an underdeveloped NIMBY --- "not in my back yard" --- tradition of civic opposition to certain developments that are known or perceived be detrimental to the neighbors. In La Villa de Los Santos, the municipality intends to build a new sewage system, which a lot of people think is a good idea. But they intend to let the solids settle out of the raw sewage in catch basins adjacent to the Rio La Villa in the Los Santos corregimiento of Santa Ana, and that suggestion offends not only the folks who would live next door to the smelly artificial ponds, but also the people downstream. The river overflows its banks from time to time, and residents argue that if the catch basins are there all the sewage will be washed into the river and most likely into homes near the river whenever there's a flood. So far the argument is on the level of pleas to public officials by people with conflicting ideas, but look for this to end up in court if the catch basin plan is accepted.

Torture suit against Noriega dismissed

We still may see some litigation in Panama, but the United States legal system is not going to hold Manuel Antonio Noriega civilly liable for torturing Thomas J. Bleming. A Wyoming federal district judge has held that Bleming's suit against Noriega, then the head of the Panama Defense Forces G-2 intelligence network, for the torture of Bleming during his 1979 - 1981 imprisonment for participating in an abortive guerrilla movement, is barred by the statute of limitations.

Blas Julio on trial again on August 7

Journalist Blas Julio, jailed for three years by the Moscoso administration after a sting that didn't get what prosecutors said it did, will go on trial again on August 7, as his acquittal has been appealed. Julio was arrested and accused of extortion of a businessman by broadcasting a series of false and defamatory news reports about him and demanding money to stop. However, the "trophy" video that was released to the television stations by the then Attorney General José Antonio Sosa didn't actually show any such extortion attempt. Nevertheless, Julio spent about three years in La Joya Penitentiary awaiting trial, suffering health problems and, he claimed, maltreatment by prison officials. Ultimately the extortion charges were thrown out. Julio was convicted of criminal defamation (calumnia e injuria) but that, too, was thrown out on appeal. However, prosecutors appealed and Julio is scheduled to stand trial again, this time on the defamation but not the extortion allegations. The trial will be on August 7 in the Juzgado V at the court complex in the former Gorgas Hospital in Ancon.

Divorce rate up

Catholic Monsignor José Domingo Ulloa, citing government figures, warns of a sharp increase in divorces that will have many negative social effects. Between four and five of every 10 marriages now end in divorce, he noted, roughly double the rate of just two years ago. The Catholic Church is against divorce, and the numbers of legal divorces and legal marriages will not give a complete picture about the health or disintegration of Panamanian family life because the numbers do not include figures for stable but unofficial relationships, couples who separate but do not divorce, domestic violence or unhappy marriages. Still, the numbers that Ulloa cited do add up to another indication of a complex social breakdown that has not only the church worried.

Pascal retires from the ring --- sort of

Ana Pascal was once a world champion in her 140-pound women's classification, but age and a non-boxing injury have led her to retire from the ring. However, she's not going too far from the sport. She manages the Pedro 'Rockero' Alcázar Municipal Boxing Gym in Curundu. Women's boxing is not a major professional sport, but there are ever more female amateur and professional boxers as well as boxing officials, and a growing number of women train in boxing gyms to stay fit but don't actually box.

Kunas impose press restrictions

In the wake of a report in El Panama America about child prostitution in Kuna Yala, the sahilas in Ustupu have decreed that journalists must get permission from local authorities to work in their community. Pro-corruption legislator Rogelio Alba (Independent - Kuna Yala) has defended the measure, while El Panama America and some journalists' organizations have registered their protests.

High school riots
US State Department's take on human trafficking in Panama

Costa Rica dumps Taiwan for China

Rice doesn't much impress the OAS
Panama News Briefs