Rómulo Roux, Panama
Who is he? Roux, a corporate lawyer by profession, has been appointed the new Minister of Canal Affairs by the president-elect, Ricardo Martinelli, who handily won the 4 May elections (with 60% of the vote). The incoming government will take office on 1 July, with a comfortable working majority in congress.
Why watch him? Roux will oversee the completion (by 2014) of a five-year US$5.2bn project to expand the Panama Canal, to allow it to cope with the new 'Super Tankers' transporting goods to and from Asia to the rest of the world. The project is enormous: it represents nearly a quarter of Panama's US$23bn GDP and the massive construction works alone will help sustain positive real growth in the local economy at a time when its Central American neighbours are suffering sharp downturns on the back of the global economic crisis. Inevitably, such a massive and heavily politicised national development project has been plagued by allegations of corruption at both the public and private level.
Notably, Ricardo Martinelli was himself previously Canal Affairs minister under the Mireya Moscoso administration (1999-2004), but under the incumbent Martín Torrijos government the ministry was all but eliminated, on the argument that its functions were duplicated by the Panama Canal Authority (ACP). As minister, Roux will chair the ACP board of directors. It is not clear whether he will exercise more power than the outgoing minister.
Date of Birth: 8 January 1965, Panama.
Education:
1986: Bachelor of
Science (BS) in Marketing, Babson College, US.
1992: Juris
Doctor (JD) in Law, University of Miami, US.
2001: Masters
(MA) in Mercantile Law, Universidad Santa Maria la Antigua,
Panama.
2007: Masters in Business Administration (MBA),
Kellogg University, US.
Public Life: An
independent, Roux has not held public office before. Prior to his appointment,
he had carved out a very successful career as a corporate lawyer at the local
firm Morgan & Morgan, founded in 1923 and currently Panama's largest law
firm. Roux began as an associate at the firm in 1994, and was made a partner in
September 2002.
Time
Line:
1992-1994: Associate at De Obaldía y García
de Paredes, Panama, where he first began advising national and international
clients.
November 1994- May 2009: Morgan & Morgan - Roux steadily worked his way up the ladder, gaining valuable experience on all aspects of corporate law, particularly project financing and banking, adding an MBA to his CV along the way.
Morgan & Morgan has dedicated legal teams in fields including banking and securities law, business and corporate law, environmental law, estate planning, government contracts, immigration law, insurance and reinsurance law, intellectual property law, labour and employment law, litigation, mergers and acquisitions, project finance, ship finance and registration, shipping and admiralty litigation and tax law.
The firm website cites several recognitions for
Roux:
Chambers Global 2008 - Leading Individual "General Business Law"
(M&A, Project Finance and Government Contracts).
IFLR 1000 2008 - Leading
Lawyer "Corporate Law".
Which Lawyer? Yearbook 2008 - Recognized Individual
"Corporate/M&A".
Which Lawyer? Yearbook 2008 - Recommended Individual
"Dispute Resolution".
Strengths: An experienced lawyer with intimate knowledge of national and international corporate business practices, on paper Roux looks imminently qualified for the position and likely has the private and public sector contacts to go with his impressive career. He also appears to have managerial skills. In a review of Panama-based corporate/M&A law firms, the respected Chambers Guide (Latin America) points to Roux's experience of large international corporate negotiations and cites sources as saying: “He really knows how the Americans do business; he's accessible, results-oriented and definitely one of the best".
Weaknesses: Roux's strengths are also his weaknesses: having previously represented local and regional banks in their deals to finance the Panama Canal expansion, he will now sit on the other side of the table from his old clients. Critics of the massive Canal expansion project have long claimed that one of the problems with the project is that it has too many conflicts of interest at play. Roux has already rebuffed such claims, asserting that he has now taken leave of absence from his firm and stressing that as minister he will not sit in on any discussions involving his old clients. How workable (or transparent) this half-way house position will be in practice is debatable.
Prospects: Little is known of this young lawyer, who has been personally plucked by Martinelli from the private sector to head of one of the most important government portfolios although with his new appointment, this is all set to change; the importance of his position and his career history with links to companies directly involved in the Canal expansion project, suggest he will be under immense scrutiny. Panama does not have a great reputation on corruption. Transparency International scored the country 3.2 (out of 10) in its 2007 global corruption survey, slightly up on 2006.