Martinelli's free broadband WiFi access program behind

Martinelli and his ministers at the October demonstration. Photo by the Presidencia

Lots of bochinche, but the reasons are mundane if disconcerting

Free WiFi program behind
by Eric Jackson

Conspiratorial tales are whispered, and alleged in email groups, but none of them really pan out. The problems with President Martinelli's free broadband WiFi connections for most Panamanians seem to be the usual for this administration --- an improvised "shoot from the hip" style based on insufficient homework.

The president's promise to the public was that virtually all Panamanians would get wireless broadband access for free. When the bid specifications were published, about half of the country's population (1.7 million people) would have access by October 10, and much of the other half (another 600,000 people) would have it by January 18.

Martinelli was inaugurated on July 1, work on the "Red Nacional de Acceso Universal Internet por Todos" (Internet for All Universal Access National Network) began right away, and on September 2 the contract bids of three contestants --- Liberty Technologies Corporation (Wipet), Cable & Wireless, and Fidanque Brothers (MobilNet) were opened. Liberty, a company founded in 2003 and run by CEO Moises Abadi and VP Salomon Zayat, had the highest price but won on "technical merit."

Liberty proposed $6.9 million in equipment and installation costs, and $310,000 per month to run the system, for $25.5 million over five years. By comparison, Cable & Wireless was offering $5 million to start and $400,000 per month or slightly over $24 million for five years. Fidanque Brothers offered $1.1 million to start and $158,000 per month, at $10.58 million. Liberty got the contract and Fidanque sued, but within a few weeks was persuaded to drop their challenge that was pending in the Supreme Court. October 10 came and went without the program, but on October 16 the program was officially launched, with a demonstration in Panama City.

At the program's outset, however, the government began to hedge its earlier claims. Broadband for all? Well, up to 512 kilobytes per second, but most people wouldn't get service that fast. Wireless access from your computer in your home? Only if you're lucky --- there would be "connection points" in "areas of greatest concentration."

November came and the program's parent Secretariat of Governmental Innovation, a part of the Ministry of the Presidency, was turned into a semi-autonomous authority (as in Martinelli's appointees mostly stay in office after his presidential term), the National Authority for Governmental Innovation.

Strange name, for a new service. Isn't it about the public at large getting Internet service?

But go back to the specifications. "Internet access for the general public, through portable wireless technologies" --- WiFi or WiMax --- is at the top of the list. But they want to connect police stations, hospitals, public schools and government offices, and that's where the specifications say that most of the "connection points" will be.

Also, Mr. Martinelli wants to give the government control over what Internet sites people may or may not download, specific information about what things each person who uses the system reads, and an opening page that includes government propaganda that will be the first thing that each user will see. The euphemisms in the specifications go:

Content controls based upon policy profiles defined by the government, which include such minimum common categories as pornography, peer-to-peer, download of archives, video, music and games of chance, with a minimum 95 percent effectiveness....
The service must have an access control system that can be activated at the request of the Secretary of the Presidency for Governmental Innovation [now superseded by the authority] to require an authentication factor and the management of user accounts....
The administered network must permit the logical separation of users in different domains, including the ability to define and manage different policies and profiles for authentication, assignment of bandwidth consumption limits, and other characteristics to be based upon the requisites and needs of the different user groups....
The system must have an index system with compulsory addressing to the principal pages (captive portal) to facilitate the use of the service and access to the pages of the government's preference.

So the technological challenge is not just a matter of setting up several hundred WiFi sites that the public can use. It's the creation and maintenance of a vast and automated espionage, propaganda and censorship network. That's why the October 10 deadline came and went, and so did the January 18 deadline. It's the same reason why another Martinelli initiative, a requirement to make Internet Service Providers and Internet cafes keep records of all downloads and emails that their users make --- not so much the major problem of this sort of system conflicting with the traditional Panamanian value of privacy, but because it will be a technological nightmare to run. (But of course, one way to reduce the technical problem is to be selective about whom the government watches --- reporters who are not in Martinelli's pocket, opposition politicians, labor activists, environmentalists, indigenous people who object to being dispossessed of their lands and so on.)

With the Cuban-style control function factored in, some observers in the Internet industry believe that notwithstanding its bid being the highest of the three, Liberty's bid is a lowball because it would take several times the contract price to give Mr. Martinelli the controls that he wants. (So what does that say about Cable & Wireless and the Fidanque Brothers?) In any case, what Martinelli is trying to do is taking much longer than what the contract specified.

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