By Alberto Giovanelli

Automatically translated by AI.

For several weeks, a mobilized people have been cornering the government of José Raúl Mulino. Decades of social discontent have erupted into massive protests to which the government responds with its heavy-handed strategy, which will not succeed in pacifying the country.

Bocas del Toro, the center of the rebellion

Although many popular sectors have taken to the streets with exemplary combativeness, today at the forefront of this process is the northern province of Bocas del Toro, bordering Costa Rica. For decades, the banana industry and tourism set the pace in this region, which has become synonymous with the demonstrations that have shaken the country since April.

We recall that pension reform, plans to reopen a copper mine, the agreement to impose dams on the Indio River and the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Panama and the United States were the triggers of the protests, which have resulted in strikes by teachers, banana workers, construction workers and students.

The situation has provoked a violent polarization of the country and a generalized social tension that expresses not only the discontent of what the Mulino government is doing, but also the accumulation of problems and claims that for decades were never solved, such as security, public health and access to drinking water.

The latest protests have demonstrated the State’s decision to ignore the law and the Constitution in order to defend the interests of large economic groups, and have once again confirmed the Panamanian people’s justified distrust of their institutions.

The Government and only one answer: Repression

The government of President Mulino has responded with viciousness and brutality, reinforcing the police presence, cutting the Internet and suspending the freedom of assembly and movement, applying what it has called Operation Omega, which has even provoked the denunciation of numerous disappearances in Bocas del Toro, among them those of the well-known teacher’s activist Santiago Lorenzo, more than 300 detainees and at least 2 deaths from police bullets.

At this time, it has also been announced the extension of the state of emergency in Bocas del Toro and Changuinola.

The spaces for dialogue promoted by sectors of the opposition or the Catholic Church itself have not been able to establish a bridge of communication, generating uncertainty, even among the dominant sectors that have not yet found a channel to dismantle the protests.

Geopolitical importance: the Panama Canal

Currently, Panama is not only fighting a domestic battle, but also the memorandum of understanding on defense matters, which the Mulino government signed with Washington last April, is one of the triggers of the protests.

The agreement allows the United States to have a presence in specific areas, however, a large part of the population fears that these are camouflaged military bases. For the United States, the Panama Canal is a necessity, and what it has done is to invent a lie regarding the presence of China in Panama, in order to generate this agreement of understanding, which evidently violates all the norms of international law.

Absence of the opposition

The response from bourgeois political parties and public representatives has been tepid. On April 30, a coalition of activists, independent politicians and representatives of all the bosses’ parties signed a statement condemning the memorandum and calling on Panamanians to defend their sovereignty in international forums. The declaration, intended to show a consensus in the traditional political class, did not include the issues related to the mine and the privatization of social security.

Panama’s traditional partisan political landscape has historically been based on corruption, clientelism, inter-elite struggles, and varying degrees of allegiance to the United States and the free market. This has been even more true under the Mulino administration, as the lines between government and opposition in Panama are more blurred than usual. The supposedly social democratic Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD), despite being the only force that voted as a bloc against the privatization of social security, often collaborates with Raul Mulino on legislative matters.

To deepen coordination and organize the General Strike.

We understand then that the conditions demand the broadest unity and coordination of all the sectors in struggle, to launch the general strike until the fall of Murilo. Different sectors are joining this demand and we are beginning to discuss how to continue.

An alternative revolutionary and socialist solution

It is urgent to begin to unite the different sectors in struggle until Murilo is defeated and that from below the call and the organization of a Constituent Assembly arises, where how to reorganize the country for the benefit of the poor people is debated. And that the sectors that are conscious that the fight must continue until a government of the workers, native peoples and youth, who are the ones who today are confronting the government in the streets, organize themselves.

The search for this solution is the only way to defend democratic and social rights, which we will only achieve by defeating the capitalist state and imposing a government with real participation of the exploited and oppressed in decision making and where the direction of economic and political orientation emerges from below, from the different popular sectors.

The joint elaboration between Panamanian comrades and our comrades from the rest of the Central American isthmus has allowed us to accompany from the entire LIS the experience and the political deliberation with the sectors in struggle and to propose a political program for the conjuncture. We have participated in the campaign for the freedom of the leaders and against the repression and freezing of accounts of SUNTRACS and against the expulsion from the University of Panama of the student comrade Eduardo García, of FER-29 (in which case, the sanction was fortunately suspended due to national and international pressure). Collaboration with comrades on the ground has been and is very important and we call on Panamanian anti-capitalist revolutionaries to organize and regroup behind these fundamental tasks to really influence this very important process underway.

Moving towards the construction of a revolutionary, democratic and socialist political alternative is urgent for Panama and the world. It is an immediate task, not a project for the future. Revolutionary socialists should not miss the opportunity to contribute to the organization of young workers and populations today in struggle and radicalized. The International Socialist League commits all its efforts behind this task.