Caribbean & Central America - September 2015 (ISSN 1741-4458)

A strike by workers on the project to expand the Panama Canal, planned for 12 August, was called off a day beforehand after the construction workers' union Sindicato Único de Trabajadores de Construcción y Similares (Suntracs) reached an agreement with the Grupo Unidos por el Canal (GUPC), the multinational consortium carrying out construction work on the waterway. While the agreement was a significant relief for the government of President Juan Carlos Varela and the Panama Canal Authority (ACP), there are still significant obstacles to the completion date of the canal upgrade, scheduled for April 2016.

Suntracs demanded an 8 to 9% wage increase for the 6,000 workers. In the end, the union settled for a 5% salary rise, which was geared retroactively to cover the period from 1 July 2015. The raises will cost the GUPC between US$6-US$7m. The project, to triple the canal’s existing capacity, has already overrun its initial US$5.25bn budget, leading to disputes between the GUPC and the ACP that, coupled with other labour disputes, have pushed the work way beyond schedule. It was originally due to be completed in 2014. The Panama Canal handles around 5% of global shipping, but needs to upgrade its century-old infrastructure in the face of rival bids for market share from Egypt’s Suez Canal and, closer to home, the new Nicaraguan canal being planned by a Chinese company. The Panama Canal upgrade is now 93% complete.

Other problems

A day before workers called off their strike, Angélica Maytín, the head of the Panamanian government’s anti-corruption agency, requested that one of the members of the ACP board be suspended for alleged money-laundering. Nicolás Corcione, whose business group specializes in luxury beachside developments, was appointed to the ACP board by the former Panamanian president, Ricardo Martinelli (2009-2014), who also faces the prospect of legal action over alleged corruption. Corcione has been accused of laundering money on behalf of former supreme justice court (CSJ) president, Alejandro Moncada Luna, a former close Martinelli ally, who became the first former CSJ magistrate to receive a prison sentence for corruption last year.

• Barro Blanco agreement

On 10 August the Panamanian government reached an agreement with the Ngäbe-Buglé indigenous group to continue dialogue over the Barro Blanco hydroelectric project being carried out by the Honduran company, Genisa. While President Varela said that the government will take measures to ensure minimal impact on the 36,000 people expected to be displaced by the dam, Genisa said that it was not party to the talks. In February, the national environmental authority had ordered the temporary suspension of the project for allegedly not complying with the environmental impact assessment.