Word: panama
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Current President Martin Torrijos - the son of the late Panamanian strongman Brigadier General Omar Torrijos, who got the U.S. in 1977 to sign the treaty that eventually gave the canal to Panama - has pushed through some anticorruption reforms. But scandals have persisted. Herrera's campaign had to fight allegations that it received financing from a Colombian national now in prison in Bogotá on charges of alleged extortion, money laundering and drug trafficking in exchange for political favors. (It didn't help Herrera when it was disclosed that while he was staying in Panama, the Colombian, David Murcia, had employed...
...host of other problems aggravated Panama's electorate, chief among them security, education and an antiquated public-transit system. "I have voted for the PRD for the past 25 years, but this time I [tried] my luck with Martinelli," says Pedro Gomez, owner of a small Panama City cobbler shop who says he was finally tired of "receiving nothing in return. At least Martinelli promised to give scholarships and free books to children, and my sons need them." Martinelli has also proposed construction of a $1 billion metro, both under- and above ground, along with a light-rail system. (Read...
...aggressive reform agenda. That includes budget reductions, more business-friendly labor reforms as well as financial and tax changes. Still, Martinelli's affable but strong executive personality - he's known as an imperious, sometimes right-wing businessman accustomed to seeing his orders carried out immediately - will have to battle Panama's notoriously slow and entrenched government bureaucracy...
Martinelli, who takes office July 1, will also have a delicate U.S.-related issue atop his desk: pushing the U.S. Congress to ratify the separate, bilateral free-trade agreement that Panama City and Washington signed in 2006. President Barack Obama favors it, but its passage in the U.S. has been in doubt because many in Congress are angry that Pedro Miguel Gonzalez - who has been indicted in the U.S. for the killing of a U.S. soldier in 1991 - remained president of Panama's National Assembly (until September 2008) amid the controversy. Gonzalez lost his Assembly seat in Sunday's election...
...chief of Panama, but only the nominal boss of the canal authority, Martinelli will have little technical control over what will be the nation's most important order of business during his five-year presidency (he is constitutionally limited to one term). That's the Panama Canal expansion, a massive dig that will add a third set of locks able to handle the supersize, "post-Panamax" ships. Those vessels can hold up to 12,000 20-ft.-long containers and are considered the future of commercial-cargo shipping...