The People’s Alliance called on the government of Panama to comply with the agreements

The leaders of that group, who is one of the participants in one dialogue table with the executive authority in Koukli district on the cost of living, demanded the adoption of serious measures and concrete solutions to the problems of the population such as the arbitrary prices of food. Medicine, electricity and social security.

The coordinator of the National Front for Economic and Social Rights, Jorge Guzman, told the press that in these conversations broadcast live on radio and television, people saw incompetent rulers who lacked the will to harm the interests of the private sector. Oligopoly, owners of the economy, as part of a neoliberal model.

For his part, the Secretary General of the National Confederation of Construction Workers, Saul Mendez, denounced how corruption appeared in power elites and traditional parties this Thursday with simple and powerful examples.

“Corruption in Panama is an endemic problem,” Mendez said, referring to recent cases such as bribery with Brazilian construction company Odebrecht, the process known as the Panama Papers, privatization of the Institute of Hydraulic and Electric Resources or Ports, and opaque contracts. Like Minera Panamá, public officials are immersed in it all.

“We are facing a failed state full of corruption,” he noted.

Both speakers appreciated that the most humble people had no alternative but to demonstrate in the streets and demand social justice.

During the day, both at the rally and at the dialogue table in Coquile, the groups reiterated the need to convene a full-fledged Constituent Assembly that would reshape the state, establish the Truth Commission on Corruption, and install a Social Audit Board. .

With regard to these proposals, the Executive has reiterated that they relate to reforms of laws, with provisions inconsistent with the Constitution, audits of independent entities and the powers of other institutions, such as the Comptroller General of the Republic.

The rise in the cost of medicine, fuel and food last month caused the largest social protests in decades in Panama, prompting the government to establish a single dialogue table since last July 21 with unions and unions. To agree on measures to reduce prices, they assume the presence of various irregularities.

jha / ja