Caribbean & Central America - September 2016 (ISSN 1741-4458)

President Juan Carlos Varela last month hailed a deal signed between his Partido Panameñista (PPA)-led El Pueblo Primero (EPP) coalition government and leaders from the Ngäbe Buglé indigenous comarca (indigenous political administrative region) regarding the ‘Barro Blanco’ hydroelectric dam on the Tabasará River located in the area. The deal ends 19 months of talks between Ngäbe Buglé representatives and a high-level governmental commission headed up by the country’s vice-president and foreign minister, Isabel de Saint Malo de Alvarado, regarding one of the country’s most contentious infrastructure projects.

Construction on the Barro Blanco project, which began in 2011 and is 95% complete, was being carried out by local company Generadora del Istmo S.A. (Genisa). It was expected to add 28.84MW of installed electricity production capacity to Panama’s national grid. The project remained hugely controversial, however, with the Ngäbe Buglé community complaining that it would displace thousands of local inhabitants and they had not been properly consulted about the initiative prior to its launch. With the project then suspended in February 2015, after the government determined that it fell short of the requirements of its environmental impact assessment (EIA) study, talks between both sides had been taking place ever since.

Signed on 22 August, the deal comprises various points. A presidential press release notes that these include Genisa’s withdrawal from the initiative with an as yet undesignated third independent party to manage and operate it instead. As well as the stipulation that 50% of all personnel employed in the project must be indigenous and ‘campesinos’ (peasant farmers) from the Ngäbe Buglé comarca, other points agreed include the establishment of a trust fund by President Varela with government contributions for the duration of the concession. The trust fund will promote local agriculture, fishing, forestry, eco-tourism and artisanal sectors, personnel training, and rural electrification in surrounding communities. President Varela also agreed to annul existing hydroelectric concessions on the Tabasará River and pledged that future concessions in the Ngäbe Buglé comarca must be approved by the local population through a referendum and local, regional and general congresses.

Doubts have since emerged as to whether the deal will, in fact, put paid to unrest. At the signing ceremony, the local media reported that four police agents were injured after activists reportedly threw stones, complaining that they had not been represented by the local community leaders who inked the deal – Silvia Carrera, Jeremías Montero, and Chito Gallardo. Meanwhile, on 5 September, the local press reported that protests took place in Pacora, an area in Panama district, and the provinces of Bocas del Toro and Coclé by indigenous groups opposed to the initiative.

Popularity

The most recent (August 2016) survey by pollster Dichter & Neira, released on 23 August, showed President Varela with just 35% approval, down from 40% in July and 52% in September 2015.

Amid ongoing concerns about transparency and security [RC-16-08], one public concern cited by the poll, which interviewed 1,200 people across the country bar the comarcas and Darién jungle region, is the cost of living which 86% of respondents said had increased.

Yet the most recent (12 August) report by the national statistics institute (Inec) showed the urban consumer price index (CPI) for July was up just 0.1% compared with the previous month, and 0.1% on the same month in 2015, while the accumulated rate was 1.2%. A January 2016 report by the United Nations (UN) Economic Commission for Latin America & the Caribbean put the CPI year-on-year variation for 2015 at close to 1%, similar to the 2014 rate.

• Other signs of commitment

Announcing the deal between his government and the Ngäbe Buglé community over the Barro Blanco dam, President Juan Carlos Varela highlighted other signs of commitment to the development of the Ngäbe Buglé comarca, where more than 89% of the population lives in poverty. These include an investment plan worth over US$300m for health, education, drinking water provision, electrification, road construction, and basic sanitation.