Ongoing Protests And Road Closures - Overview
By DON WINNER for Panama-Guide.com - I'm about to dive into the plethora of news reporting about the protests and road closures that are occurring all over the country. I will be publishing as many individual reports as I can, but here's an overview. On Sunday morning at dawn the government of Panama decided "enough is enough" and proceeded to reopen the Inter American highway where the indigenous Ngöbe-Buglé Indians had been protesting and blocking the road since last Tuesday, 31 January 2012. The police used tear gas and rubber bullets and were met with thrown rocks, sticks, and machetes. One protester was killed, at least forty injured, and several police officers were injured as well, including one who lost a finger, the result of a hurled stone. There were dozens of arrests.
Confusing And Mixed Signals: Reading the tea leaves on all of this is difficult because the whole thing was caused by the opposition Revolutionary Democratic Party (PRD). The protesters were simply trying to evoke this "violent" response so the PRD politicians could make their public cries against the "repression" by the government. It doesn't help matters any that all of the news media outlets in Panama have been bought by one political party or the other, so there's very little unbiased or neutral sources of information out there. And then add to that the apparent need by Security Minister Jose Raul Mulino to just flat out lie. Yesterday morning he categorically denied that the riot control officers of the National Police had entered the residential areas of the town of San Felix, when simultaneously there were reporters on the ground who were giving live blow-by-blow reporting of the tear gas wafting through the homes of senior citizens. So combine political motivations, strong media bias, and feeble attempts at official spin control, and what you end up with is a confusing soup of a string of incidents, rumor, gossip, false accusations, lies, and bias - and underneath all of that somewhere lies the actual truth of what's really going on, on the ground.
Where The Rubber (Bullets) Meet The Road: I'm going to be focusing on the things that matter most. What's going on, where. I'll be ignoring most of the politically motivated statements being made by politicians, on all sides. At this point you should be avoiding the areas of conflict. If you have a real, true emergency for health or some other reason, then make sure to scream early and loud in order to get help. If you see a group blocking the roadway, go in the other direction. If you have the opportunity to stock up on anything - food, water, fuel, medicines, etc. - do so. There are sympathy protests and demonstrations popping up all over the place, and the situation is fluid. I will be doing my best to keep up. If there's something happening in your neighborhood or area - please send a write-up to don@panama-guide.com and I'll get it up if I can. Keep your heads down, guys.
Copyright 2012 by Don Winner for Panama-Guide.com. Go ahead and use whatever you like as long as you credit the source. Salud.
