Panama News Briefs

Panama News Briefs

Government blames pilot, but controversy continues

Without waiting for the results from Canada about the study of the Huey helicopter's engines, the Torrijos administration has issued a report blaming last May's crash of National Air Service helicopter SAN-100 on the pilot, who was killed in the accident. However, La Prensa has obtained a copy of a 2007 letter in which the president's pilot, Major Alexis Camarena reportedly advised that the old aircraft was in poor condition and should not be used. The Torrijos administration is claiming that La Prensa's document is a forgery and has produced its own version, which La Prensa claims is altered. In any case, the government withheld the document from the committee investigating the accident, which took the lives of 11 people, including the chief of Chile's Caribinero militarized police and two of Panama's National Police commissioners. The alleged pilot error? First, that there was a missing cotter pin in the propeller shaft and that the pilot should have inspected his helicopter and noticed it; second, that the pilot's documentation of his flight hours was inadequate; third, the pilot's failure to file a flight plan for the fatal flight, which ended in a crash on Avenida Central. The one survivor, the co-pilot, said that there was a loss of power in one of the engines before the crash, but since then the government has kept him unavailable for comment. The appearance that the investigation is a sham designed to deflect criticism from the Panamanian government's poor maintenance of the things that it owns is being played up in the Chilean press. Prosecutors have called Camarena to testify about his letter. The Torrijos administration says it will file a criminal complaint asking for an investigation of people at La Prensa (and maybe their sources, because if not that would indicate a government set-up) for forgery of the letter, while La Prensa is asking for a similar investigation by the Public Ministry and has also filed a habeas data request for all documents related to SAN-100 and its maintenance.

Unity --- What's that?

Former Vice President Guillermo Ford, now the leader of the Union Patriotica party (which has endorsed Ricardo Martinelli as its presidential candidate), says he's going to lead an effort to unify the opposition parties in order to present a united slate against the Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) next May. On both sides of the essential political divide, exaggerated partisanship is making alliances difficult. The ruling PRD isn't offering its much smaller junior partners the Partido Popular or the Liberals anything of significance, and moreover there's strain between the Liberals and the PRD because of the Liberals' nomination of independent Miguel Antonio Bernal as their mayoral candidate. (A respectable showing for Bernal in the mayoral race saves the Liberals' ballot status, while a deal with the PRD which assigns a few legislative nominations to the Liberals probably does not.) The Partido Popular has been seeing mass defections to the Martinelli campaign, and there is a chance that if the party doesn't get an offer that makes its survival likely from the PRD it may as an organization jump ship to Martinelli. Meanwhile on the opposition side former President Guillermo Endara's Vanguardia Moral de la Patria party says it will go it alone, but its support is in single digits and it's losing members; while the much larger Panameñista Party, historically one of the country's two major parties, is insisting that it must lead the opposition and is offering other anti-PRD parties very little in a possible alliance. The problem for the Panameñistas is that their presidential candidate, Juan Carlos Varela, is running a bit behind Martinelli in some of the polls and the party's one remaining potential ally at this point, the Nationalist Republican Liberal Movement (MOLIRENA), is disappointed with the offer they have received and may seek an alliance with Martinelli instead. Parties have until the end of next January to make their alliances, and the bargaining situations of the various forces won't start to clear up until after the PRD's September 7 primary. But don't look for a PRD running against an opposition electorate split right down the middle as it appears to be right now --- it's far more likely to see the PRD, one major opposition candidate and any other opposition figures on the ballot diminishing to distant also-rans.

Another corruption complaint about Balbina

How sweet it is to be favored by the Electoral Tribunal! When Balbina Herrera fairly flagrantly used Ministry of Housing funds for a “women's leadership luncheon” to support her political fortunes, complaints were duly filed in late March and there has still been no decision. But when her campaign committee complained of a Juan Carlos Navarro ad criticizing her, the Electoral Tribunal took less than two hours to ban the ads. Ah, but now there's a complaint against Balbina that's in a different court system. Former Arraijan Mayor Jaime Barroso and one Jessica Marín have accused Balbina of embezzlement of state funds and misconduct in office for improperly voiding fines against dozens of developers for a wide variety of infractions. The case has been referred to anti-corruption prosecutor Maribel Cornejo. However, before Cornejo can investigate she has to get permission from the Electoral Tribunal, as Herrera has immunity because she's a candidate.

3,093 voter addresses rejected

Out of more than 4,000 individuals whose voting addresses were challenged, the Electoral Tribunal had thrown out 3,093 registrations and ordered those individuals to vote at their old addresses. Criminal investigations may ensue about the origins of the improper registrations, wherein people attempted to be listed so as to vote where they don't live. Bogus registrations were found around the country, but were particularly concentrated in two electoral circuits, one in Panama Oeste and the other in Veraguas, and particularly among PRD members. Legislative immunity will likely prevent a thorough investigation but all indications are that the campaigns of PRD legislators Freidi Torres (from Veraguas) and Franz Wever (from Panama City, but seeking re-election from the San Carlos - Chame area) sought to pack the voter rolls in their circuits with supporters who don't live there.

Mid-August poll shows?

It shows President Torrijos's approval rating up a bit, to 49.9 percent. The National Assembly, with its absolute PRD majority, gets bad or very bad performance ratings from 63.7 percent of those surveyed, and the PRD-dominated Supreme Court gets a 63.3 percent disapproval rating. When all opposition and PRD presidential candidates are listed, Balbina Herrera leads with 23.3 percent to Ricardo Martinelli's 20.1 percent to Juan Carlos Varela's 17.8 percent to Juan Carlos Navarro's 15.2 percent, with other candidates taking small percentages and more than 20 percent telling pollsters that they don't know, won't say or won't vote. But when opposition supporters were asked who should be the opposition candidate, Juan Carlos Varela led Ricardo Martinelli 46.6 to 45.3 percent. Most voters identified inflation and crime as their biggest concerns. This was the Dichter & Neira poll taken in mid-August and published on August 26, taken nationwide except for the Darien and the comarcas --- the Ngobe-Bugle Comarca being, with about eight or nine percent of Panama's population and a history of political volatility, one of the election's key battlegrounds. What does it all say? It says that Panama is politically volatile, more than anything else. What does it not say? It doesn't really give a precise snapshot of the PRD primary races, as there were no numbers given for what a sample of PRD members only thought about it. It does seem, however, that as of mid-August Balbina Herrera was leading Juan Carlos Navarro in the presidential primary race and Bobby Velásquez was leading Noel Riande in the Panama City mayoral race.

Legislator accuses candidate of spreading manure

PRD legislator Zulay Vásquez, who represents Capira and is a member of Balbina Herrera's slate, has denounced a candidate for representante in the PRD primary, Andrés Castillo, of misuse of public assets. She told the Telemtro TV network that Castillo had improperly passed out bags of fertilizer to farmers in the corregimiento of Ciri de Los Sotos.

Vanguardia Moral activists arrested

President Torrijos's “get tough on crime” policies came to Puerto Pilon in Colon on the afternoon of August 17, when police arrested three members of Guillermo Endara's Vanguardia Moral de la Patria party, including a candidate for representante, Vladimir Ortega. Their highly animalistic crime? The activists, with representatives of the Electoral Tribunal in attendance, were signing up new members for the opposition party. They were released after about four hours in custody, but the cops were successful in busting up that day's party recruiting drive.

Gómez seeks just one poisoned medicine trial

More than two years after professionals in the nation's public health care systems told their superiors about an unusual rash of deaths, and a few months less than two years short of the government cover-up that caused many more deaths, Attorney General Ana Matilde Gómez is seeking a trial for just one person --- former Seguro Social pharmacy and drugs chief Pablo Solís --- for the hundreds of deaths that were caused by the mixing of lethal diethylene glycol mislabeled as glycerin into cough syrups and other medications at the Seguro Social medicine production lab. The theory is that Solís neglected his duty to take care that the nation's medicine supply wasn't tainted. It may be difficult to prove, as for many years Seguro Social directors and boards of directors, and the national government, rejected requests to fund the equipment and personnel needed to adequately test the products coming out of the medicine lab. Gómez argues that there is insufficient proof to accuse Seguro Social director René Luciani, on whose watch the disaster struck, for his failure to protect the medicine supply, and further argues that the courts have no jurisdiction over past directors and other persons who had previously been accused in the case. The Torrijos administration, having cut funding for the toxicology tests to determine which deaths were caused by the poisoning and argued that without positive test results the poisonings never happened, recognizes about 120 victims whom it has promised compensation but the true death toll is probably well over 400.

Park not included on endangered list

Environmentalists failed in their attempt to get La Amistad International Park (PILA), which is partly in Panama and partly in Costa Rica, declared an Endangered World Heritage Site. It's recognized by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as a World Heritage Site and faces various threats, from orchid poaching and farm chemical runoff to a series of dams on the Changuinola River and its tributaries. UNESCO, meeting in Canada, expressed its concern, particularly about the dams, but declined to rate the park as endangered.

Floods rout Juan Diaz residents

On August 26 853 residents of the San Fernando neighborhood of the Panama City corregimiento of Juan Diaz were flooded out of their homes when the Juan Diaz River overflowed its banks. This was not the first time that residents of this low-lying area had been affected by floods. The worst affected homes had water three feet deep and a residue of polluted mud left behind.

Jones files libel suit

Attorney Carlos Jones, driving at a high velocity, crossed over a median, crashing into an oncoming car and killing the couple inside of it. After intense legal maneuvering, including the disappearance of the wreck of the car he was driving, he was convicted of negligent homicide and sentenced to prison. After yet more legal maneuvering, he has managed to get a court order preventing his incarceration. El Siglo journalist wrote about that process in a story entitled “Supreme Court could investigate possible corruption,” and for her trouble she is now being sued for $100,000 by Jones. And maybe he has a point. Maybe everything is arranged so that there is no possibility that the Supreme Court might investigate just why it is that Jones, whose conviction has not been overturned, is still at large. Among journalists, however, this lawsuit is just another example of how Panama's legal system is used to suppress the publication of information that the public has a right to receive.

High court allows complaint against prosecutor

The Supreme Court has ordered the Public Ministry to open an investigation of a complaint brought against one of its assistant prosecutors. Lawyers for the SUNTRACS construction workers union and its number two leader Saúl Méndez attempted to file a complaint that assistant prosecutor Luis Martínez falsified evidence and abused his authority in bringing charges that Méndez paid a small-time hoodlum $500 and gave him a pistol in order to start a violent incident at a 2007 labor march. Judge Ileana Turner threw out those charges earlier this year, after which Méndez went to the Public Ministry with his complaint, which Attorney General Ana Matilde Gómez refused to accept.

Court lifts legislator's immunity

National Assembly deputy Alberto Barranco (Panameñista - La Chorrera) will be facing a criminal investigation that he converted a pickup truck that belonged to the Barrio Colon Community Council to his own use and possession. He drove the vehicle when he was representante of that corregimiento from 1999 to 2004, and allegedly kept it after he moved up to the legislature.

Taiwan disavows dollar diplomacy

The separatists are out, Chiang Kai-shek's old party is back in and the new president of Taiwan, Ma Ying-jeou, stopped off in Panama on August 13 and met briefly and privately with President Torrijos. The message that Ma is taking around to the Latin American countries that maintain ties with Taiwan is that the old “dollar diplomacy” by which Taiwan kept its diplomatic ties by offering aid in the form of cash (which was frequently pocketed by corrupt Latin American officials) have come to their end. Taiwan is, along with Spain, a leading aid donor for Panama.

Drug War dissent within the PRD

There are a few Panamanian political figures brave enough to state the obvious and draw the suggested conclusions. Years ago former government minister and later banking superintendent Delia Cárdenas (a member of the conservative MOLIRENA party) opined that trying to fight drugs via the criminal law was from a financial point of view a waste of money and that the country would be better off legalizing drugs. Now Carlos Duque, one of the grand old men of the PRD and a member of the Central American Parliament (whose own premises have been found on more than one occasion to have housed drug smuggling rings) has told La Estrella that he thinks that although drugs are a scourge that must be fought, it would be easier to discourage drug use if the substances were legal.

President's cousin a burnout

He's not a Rastafarian, and in any case, although it was known that Rastafari (the late Ethiopean Emperor Haile Selassie I) owned a brewery, there is scant historical evidence that he smoked the ganja weed. Nope, presidential cousin Luis Sánchez Torrijos just appears to be a pothead who had some resources and initiative. Sánchez Torrijos and a friend, Milton Reyes, were growing sinsemilla under lights in an apartment on Calle Uruguay, were reportedly turned in by neighbors and have been arrested. Prosecutors say that 17 kilos of marijuana were seized from the apartment, but they didn't specify what percentage of this was the prized female flowers. Sánchez and Reyes reportedly told prosecutors that they are not in the drug selling business but just really like to smoke pot, and it appears that at least as to the latter assertion, urine tests indicate that what they are said to have said is true.

728 keys of coke, four men seized after Pilon shootout

Four Colombian men and 728 kilos of cocaine were captured by police when they were caught unloading a speedboat on the beach in the Colon Costa Arriba community of Pilon during the pre-dawn hours of August 14. The bust prompted a shootout and two other suspects managed to flee.

Unconcealed gangland execution

At about 3 p.m. on August 27 students and teachers at the Homero Ayala elementary school in Juan Diaz heard some gunshots in the street and went out to see two bound men had been shot in their heads and killed in a white Suzuki, and four men driving away in a Nissan Sentra. The license number of the fleeing car was taken and Tourism Police intercepted it at a Corredor Norte entrance. The two slain men were Colombian citizens, while the four men arrested at the autopista entrance included two Panamanians and two Colombians. Panama has been seeing a major upsurge in gangster executions this year, as rival Mexican cartels and their Colombian and Panamanian junior partners fight for control of drug smuggling routes from South America to the USA.

Bomberos attacked at Colon rooming house fire

On August 16 a rooming house on Colon's Calle 9 caught fire, destroying 18 units and their residents' possessions within them. When the bomberos responded to the fire they were greeted by individuals throwing rocks, bottles and sticks at them, which disrupted their effort to quench the blaze. (It's doubtful that much could have been done in any case, because as the flames quickly spread cannisters of cooking gas began to explode, making efforts at both firefighting and rescuing some possessions too dangerous.) Two firefighters and one resident were injured in the incident.

Expelled high school kids return, kicked out again

René Pancca Calderón, Christian Díaz and Lisbeth Robinson, three student members of the Instituto Nacional's leftist movement who were expelled on orders of the Ministry of Education after disturbances last June, are still out of school no matter what the courts say. Pancca Calderón got a court order overturning the expulsion from Fourth Penal Circuit Judge Kathia Rojas on the grounds that there was no due process in the ministry's summary expulsion order --- the Torrijos administration held a “hearing” about which the accused students were not notified and refused to provide the alleged evidence to the students. The students returned to classes for a day, but were pulled out again when the ministry appealed. The students then got the Supreme Court to take cognizance of their case and attempted to return to classes, but the school administration has excluded them on the basis that it has yet to receive a court order mandating their return.

Oral arguments in the Santander Tristán Donoso case

Santander Tristán Donoso is a lawyer, and he has defended some high-profile clients in his time. Back in the 90s, the notorious Attorney General José Antonio Sossa saw fit to play tapes of Tristán's telephone conversations with a client, both at a meeting of the Colegio de Abogados and for representatives of the Archdiocese of Panama. It was clearly intended to intimidate all criminal defense lawyers by demonstrating that under Sossa there was no such thing as attorney-client privilege. But Tristán Donoso complained in the press that Sossa had illegally tapped his phones, whereupon Sossa charged the lawyer with calumnia e injuria (criminal defamation). Although the facts about the wiretaps and their origin remained shrouded in government secrecy, Tristán was convicted and the case has wound its way through all of Panama's court system to the court of last resort --- by treaty --- the Inter-American Human Rights Court. On August 12 an international panel of judges heard arguments in this case and is expected to within a few months issue a ruling not only on the specific charges against Tristán but also on Panama's criminal defamation laws in general.

US Court of Appeals reverses Posada Carriles's win

It was both a legal victory and a propaganda defeat for the Miami-based Cuban exile movement when, in May of 2007, US Federal District Judge Kathleen Cardone threw out immigration fraud charges against anti-Castro terrorist Luis Posada Carriles. Posada and several accomplices were pardoned by Mireya Moscoso on her way out of office --- pardons that have since been voided by Panama's Supreme Court --- on charges connected with a plot to set off a powerful bomb at the University of Panama during a 2000 appearance by Fidel Castro there. The Torrijos administration has requested Posada's extradition. Posada is also wanted by Venezuela as a prison escapee, having fled with guards' connivance when he was imprisoned for setting off a bomb on a Cubana airliner and killing 73 people. After his escape a Venezuelan court (well before Hugo Chávez's time) handed Posada a 30-year sentence in absentia. Cuba also wants Posada for a string of 1990s hotel bombings, one of which killed an Italian tourist. He'd face a possible death penalty in Cuba. The Bush administration has resisted requests for Posada's extradition, arguing that he'll face persecution if extradited. But then there was the matter that Posada, although a former CIA employee and member of Oliver North's notorious Contra supply team, is not an American citizen and illegally entered the United States. The charges that Cardone dismissed were related to that immigration matter, but on August 14 a three-judge panel of the Fifth US Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans reversed her ruling and remanded the case for Posada's trial on seven counts of immigration fraud and perjury. The ruling increases the chances of Posada being sent to Panama to finish his eight-year sentence here.

news