In that magnificent bioceanic country, known for birdwatching, the Canal and the lush rainforest within the confines of the capital, an unexpected and serious crisis is taking place.
The one in Panama seemed like a «pastry pain, it’s a chronic migration». This is what Luis, a Spanish lawyer who has lived in the isthmus for 16 years, says regarding it. It seemed like a temporary headache but instead it’s a chronic migraine. An internal and international crisis.
After weeks of gestation and 3 days of examination, the Supreme Court approved “by majority” the authorization for the participation of José Raúl Mulino as a candidate in tomorrow’s presidential elections on behalf of the Realizando Metas and Alianza parties, replacing Ricardo Martinelli , convicted of money laundering in the New Business case and took refuge in Nicaragua. The numbers: Mulino leads the polls with 25-30% of voting intentions, double that of his immediate rivals, the former social democratic president Martín Torrijos (in government from 2004 to 2009) and the centre-right candidates Ricardo Lombana and Rómulo Roux.
An impasse that has worn out the establishment. One of the richest countries in Latin America, an area slightly smaller than Austria, a per capita income of 17 thousand dollars a year and a placid income from the Canal, opened in 1914. A cyclopean work that has redesigned relations international economies: a 12,700 kilometer shortcut, an alternative to the circumnavigation of South America. And it is precisely the driving force of the Panamanian economy that no longer accumulates the same energy. Generating the crisis.
Dry canal
The drought imposes a reduction in ship traffic along the Canal, in those 65 kilometers that cut the Central American isthmus connecting the Pacific and Atlantic. 5% of global trade passes through here. The current system requires an enormous quantity of water: the entrance to the canal and the exit have a height difference of 28 metres, which the ships travel through a system of locks which are filled with water to allow boats to climb to the level of the next section.
#Elections #world #Panama #polls #Canal #drought
2024-05-06 10:33:43
