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This is very interesting: President Ricardo Martinelli's honeymoon with the electorate is, meanwhile, over. The president, whose cousin and former campaign fundraiser is currently in jail in Mexico because of charges he laundered money for the Beltran Leyva brothers drug cartel, is facing increasing opposition to his authoritarian ruling style and blatant disregard for Panama's constitution and separation of powers. In what he himself calls a drive to end systemic corruption, he is going after opposition figures almost exclusively and the credibility of his efforts further eroded when he schemed to have Attorney General Ana Matilde Gómez removed from her post by using faux charges against her by a prosecutor who had been caught red-handed running an extortion ring. The case already appears to have cost him ratification of the Free Trade Agreement with the US. His refusal to act against legislators of his own alliance who are involved in funneling millions of dollars from the Social Investment Fund into their own coffers hasn't helped him either, and even his supporters question the effectiveness of his mano dura approach to fight rising crime rates. If he drags Panama into a fourth generation warfare conflict on top of that, it will certainly cost him what remains of his approval rate. |
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