Panama going a different way?

It looks like the Panamanian people are finally fed up with generations of corrupt politicians from the two traditional parties PRD and the Arnulfistas.

The latest poll shows that Ricardo Martinelli would win if a presidential election was held today. The current president Martin Torrijos is unbelieavably low, considering how popular he was at the last elections. Last time I wanted Martinelli to win, but I personally think Torrijos has done a better than estimated job.

So why is this significant to the world? Panama, just like the rest of Latin America is sick of corruption. Even if Martin appears trust worthy he has surrounded himself with the usual suspects of corrupt cronies, just like his predecessor Mireya. Now where Panama is different is that they seem to be rallying on Martinelli, who is anything but a man of the people. Which is completely different than what happened in Bolivia with Frequent Flier Evo and Chavez Venezuelas wannabe Saddam Castro.

Martinelli is a serial entrepreneur and very succesful at it. People were laughing at his slogan at the last election “Walking in the shoes of the people” due to his very non working class image. However he has generally been respected as trustworthy and as a great administrator from his time as leader of both the Canal and the Social Security program.

He was one of the few people to dare to say that social security reforms where necessary at the last election. Martin tried a half baked reform which was badly managed, this was probably the number one cause for his fall of grace with the voters. We will see if he wins in 2009 how he will handle that.

The thing that I think is most different about Martinelli is his policy on corruption. Where all the other parties have come out with smart sounding sound bites, they have not done anything drastic to reduce it. Martinelli has a great plan for transparency and promises jail for corrupt politicans and officials. At the moment, nothing really happens to them except that they lose their US visa.

I’m still skeptical that Martinelli will remain popular until the election, but I can only hope. The good thing is that even though Chavez has tried infiltrating Panama through his bolivarian circles, there is no Evo Morales on the horizon (yet).