Panama in Struggle: National Strike Unites Popular Resistance and Defence of Sovereignty
On 29th April, the construction workers’ strike began, and on 23rd April, the powerful strike of Panama’s education workers commenced. The two strongest unions in the country are in the streets demanding the immediate repeal of Law 462, which reformed social security. The legislation ends the solidarity pension system, transfers the pensions of thousands of workers to bankers, and increases the minimum retirement age. Workers are also against the return of operations by the mining company First Quantum and against the signing of a memorandum of cooperation between the United States and Panama that authorises the installation of three military bases, more than 2,000 soldiers, and toll exemptions for military vessels crossing the canal.
Photo: Telesur
Asoprof (teachers’ union) and Suntracs (construction union) are leading the mobilisations. The revocation of Law 462 is strategic because the government’s defeat would be a victory for Panamanians and would put Raul Molino’s government in a defensive position regarding the return of First Quantum’s operations and the memorandum signed with the United States.
In 2023, massive mobilisations spread throughout Panama, with protests centred on demanding an end to operations by the mining company First Quantum, which has Canadian, American, Chinese and South Korean capital. Open-pit mining is one of the most aggressive forms of mining; besides deforestation, it causes soil contamination and various other environmental impacts. Faced with this crime against the environment, traditional populations, indigenous people, young people and workers – with Suntracs and Asoprof at the forefront – led a series of mobilisations that defeated the government and the transnational First Quantum, which had extracted almost half of its profits until 2023 from Panama.
"The Panamanian constitution prohibits the administration of Panama’s natural resources by foreign states. FQM is owned by capital from Canada, the United States, South Korea and China. It is not just a private foreign company; it is also partially owned by capital from these foreign countries.
Despite this, the company had been exploiting copper and other minerals in the mine without paying taxes between 2017 and 2023. According to FQM’s financial reports, the Cobre Panama mine accounted for 48% of FQM’s global profits.“Despite all these absurdities, the Panamanian government forwarded a project to renew the concession to the mining company, which was analysed and approved by congress in record time.”...Congress approved the contract on 21st October, after only three days of discussion. This provoked a social explosion in a country that was already fed up with the inaccessible price of medicines, lack of social security and very high cost of living."
The mobilisations achieved, in the streets, a historic victory, a milestone in the environmental struggle and an unprecedented defeat, both for the transnational First Quantum and for Raul Molino’s government.
American neocolonialism vs popular mobilisation.
The small country located in Central America suffered from an invention of the US interventionist policy at the end of the 19th century to enable the construction and control of the canal linking the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean to facilitate the movement of the North American fleet in the war against the Spanish Empire, thus marking the beginning of the colonial policy of the nascent capitalist power.
The then newly created Panama formalised an agreement that guaranteed the United States almost a century of control over the canal, the establishment of a militarised zone and the use of essentially American labour. In December 1999, after almost a century, and after various episodes of mobilisation and struggle by the Panamanian people, the canal was returned to Panama.
Donald Trump’s statements after taking office announce, without embarrassment, the neocolonial orientation of the United States and place the economic war with China at the centre, in this sense the control of the Panama Canal is a key piece. On 10th April, the visit of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth concretised Trump’s threats in the memorandum of understanding. In addition to the toll exemption for American military ships, the installation of military bases in Panama was agreed upon, the permanence of military personnel, which already reaches 3,000 men, as well as freeing Panamanian territory for US military exercises. At the same time, the Panamanian government threatens to revoke the Chinese concession to operate two ports at the ends of the canal.
Faced with Donald Trump’s neocolonial offensive and the servility of Raul Molino’s reactionary government, the national strike of Panamanian workers places at the centre of the mobilisations the anti-colonial struggle for national sovereignty and Panamanian control over the Canal and against the military presence on national soil.
So far, reports coming from Panama indicate that the strike is widespread among the two main categories, with strong popular support and from youth, but it is being harshly repressed by the government with reports of dozens of arrests in various provinces of the country.
All support and solidarity to the Panamanian people. The victory of Panamanians is a victory for all Latin American people and a defeat for Donald Trump and Raul Molino.
Antonio Neto
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