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C O N F I D E N T I A L PANAMA 000725 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/25/2018 
TAGS: PGOV PREL PM
SUBJECT: PANAMA'S NEW SECURITY LAWS PASSED AMIDST OPPOSITION 
 
REF: A. REF A:PANAMA 00669 
     ¶B. REF B: PANAMA 00325 
     ¶C. REF C: PANAMA 00704 
 
Classified By: Amb. Barbara J. Stephenson for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) 
 
------- 
Summary 
------- 
 
¶1.  (C)  The GOP approved five controversial security laws by 
decree on August 18 and 20. The decrees will: 1) create an 
independent civilian intelligence service (SENIS); 2) create 
a coast guard (SENAN); 3) create a frontier force to protect 
the borders (SENAFRONT); 4) reform the Panamanian National 
Police law to allow a uniformed officer to lead the force; 
and 5) develop the legal framework of the existing 
Institutional Protection Service (which provides protection 
to the President and other VIPs), including allowing a 
uniformed officer to lead that force. The GOP has argued that 
these laws are necessary to modernize the security forces to 
deal with potential threats to the Canal, increasing 
organized crime and drug dealing activity, and increasing 
rates  of common crime.  The proposals had drawn sharp 
protest from civil society groups, the main business 
organizations, and some government officials. The protests 
centered on the approval of politically sensitive laws by 
decree, and the perception among some groups that the GOP was 
attempting to "re-militarize" Panama. This perception was 
reinforced by the presence in the GOP of several Ministers 
with ties to the Noriega regime, including Minister of 
Government and Justice Daniel Delgado. (Note: The Ministry of 
Government and Justice controls almost all Panama's security 
forces. End Note). Those opposing the laws have tried to tie 
them to the Merida Initiative, and have accused the USG of 
pushing the reforms as part of the Global War on Terrorism. 
It remains to be seen if the passage of the laws will lead to 
a decline in protests.  The security laws have already become 
an issue in the upcoming elections, thus drawing the robust 
and far-reaching U.S. security relationship with Panama into 
the domestic political debate. Post encourages all USG 
agencies to treat this issue cautiously, as Post attempts to 
separate the USG's long-term security relationship with 
Panama from internal Panamanian politics.  End Summary. 
 
-------------------------------------------- 
Laws Passed Under the Cover of Olympic Party 
-------------------------------------------- 
 
¶2.  (C)  President Martin Torrijos decreed two of the five 
security laws that had been under consideration for the last 
month (see Ref A) on August 18, and the remaining three on 
August 20. The laws were approved by Torrijos after being 
debated by the Cabinet under special decree powers that were 
granted to Torrijos by the National Assembly (NA) on July 3, 
prior to its summer recess. The powers were set to run out on 
August 31, thereby putting the GOP under pressure to act 
quickly. The GOP had been engaged in a "consultation" 
process, whereby officials met with civil society leaders to 
explain the proposals, in an attempt to blunt growing 
opposition among civil society groups and the major 
newspapers. The "consultation" process failed in this goal, 
as almost every group that met with the officials came out in 
the papers the following days questioning the laws, and 
calling for a wider debate over the proposed changes. 
Further, many opposition political, NGO, civil society, 
media, and other leaders refused to participate in these 
last-minute consultations. 
 
¶3.  (C)  Political analyst Jose Blandon, Sr., a political 
analyst who was working with the Cabinet on this project, 
told PolCouns August 15 that he had recommended to President 
Torrijos that the laws be passed quickly to prevent the 
opposition from reaching critical mass. Blandon reported that 
Torrijos would approve the laws on August 18-20, hoping that 
reaction would be muted due to popular recent wage increases, 
and the distraction of an intense primary contest for the 
Presidential nomination within the ruling Democratic 
Revolutionary Party (PRD). The GOP caught a lucky break when 
Irving Saladino won Panama's first ever gold medal on August 
¶18. Torrijos declared a holiday to celebrate on August 21, 
the same day the papers announced the approval of the last 
three laws. 
 
-------------------------------- 
New Intelligence Service Created 
-------------------------------- 

¶4.  (C)  The most controversial of the five laws approved by 
the GOP is the Decree Law Number 9, that reorganizes the 
Committee of Public Security and National Defense (CSPDN) and 
creates the National Intelligence and Security Service 
(SENIS). Up to now, the CSPDN has served as a Panamanian 
version of the U.S. National Security Council (NSC), with an 
unofficial spy agency, the Executive Secretariat, appended to 
it. The original structure of the CSPDN was established by an 
Executive Decree from 1991, modified in 2001. The new law 
breaks the SENIS off from the CSPDN, creating a stand alone 
intelligence agency (SENIS) and a true Panamanian NSC, the 
CSPDN. The law places the SENIS under the Minister of the 
Presidency. The SENIS is responsible for providing the 
President and the GOP, "the information, analysis, studies 
and proposals that allow (the GOP) to prevent and avoid any 
danger, threat or aggression against the independence, 
sovereignty and territorial integrity (of Panama), as well as 
against the national interests and the stability of the Rule 
of Law and the institutions of the State." The SENIS is thus 
empowered to act against a wide range of ill-defined threats, 
though the officers are required to "respect human rights and 
fundamental guarantees," and forbidden to engage in political 
or union activities, political espionage, release information 
they have gathered in the course of their official duties, or 
any other activity which, "damages the life, honor, or 
property of people." 
 
¶5.  (C)  The law as passed is significantly different from 
the draft law as first proposed and presented to the public 
on GOP websites and in the consultation process. Indeed, it 
is five pages shorter. All mention of the SENIS's 
responsibility for classifying information is omitted, as is 
the new classification system that was proposed, and much of 
the language referring to the secret nature of the SENIS. The 
new law also omits the entire judicial and legislative 
oversight provision. (Comment: It seems likely that these 
changes were designed to take out of the public view some of 
the aspects of the law which were more controversial, and 
those that required more detailed work, like the oversight 
provisions. Furthermore, the fact that changes recommended 
during the GOP's limited consultation process were 
incorporated has been lost on the public as the Torrijos 
Administration has done a poor job at communicating these 
changes. End Comment.) 
 
¶6.  (C)  Jaime Abad, former Director of the Judicial 
Investigative Police (PTJ) and GOP consultant on the security 
laws, told PolOff August 18 that the SENIS law was needed 
because the CSPDN already engaged in all the espionage 
activities the law described, but with no legal safeguards at 
all. He said the requirement of judicial approval for 
"preventative" wiretaps (Note: Removed from the version of 
the bill that was decreed. End Note)  was particularly 
important. Speaking before a Forum on the laws organized by 
the opposition alliance of the Democratic Change party (CD) 
and the Patriotic Union (UP) party on August 11, Abad said 
that Panama faced real threats due to the presence of the 
Canal, and the proximity of Colombia, and had to develop 
institutions that could detect and prevent attacks before 
they occurred. 
 
------------------ 
Return of the G-2? 
------------------ 
 
¶7.  (C)  The SENIS has been the most criticized aspect of the 
five laws. Opposition has been led by a new civil society 
organization called the Democratic Citizen's Network (RDC). 
The head of Transparency International in Panama, Angelica 
Maytin, who is now also RDC's spokesperson, told PolOff 
August 6 that the main promoters of this movement were three 
famous leaders of the "civilista" resistance to the Noriega 
regime: Roberto "Bobby" Eisenmann, businessman, founder of La 
Prensa newspaper, exiled under Omar Torrijos; Mauro Zuniga, a 
doctor who was almost beaten to death for opposing the 
Noriega regime; Miguel Antonio Bernal, independent candidate 
for Mayor of Panama City, university professor, exiled under 
Omar Torrijos at the same time as Eisenmann. The RDC has been 
sponsoring weekly protests in front of the same church in 
central Panama City where anti-Noriega protests took place at 
the end of the 1980s. Eisenmann told PolCouns August 8 that 
he could not understand why the GOP would try to legislate on 
such a sensitive issue by decree. He noted that while some of 
the changes might look fine on paper, the history and 
institutional weakness upon which they were being built made 
it impossible to give the GOP the benefit of a doubt. Maytin, 
at the same meeting, said that Torrijos was rushing to 
approve the reforms now because he would loose his authority 
among the PRD NA deputies after the PRD primaries scheduled 
for September 7. Maytin said the proper place to discuss an 
issue as sensitive as security reform was either the NA, or 
the "Concertacion," a national dialogue committee that has 
frequently been used to discuss important issues in Panama. 
Eisenmann said that the RDC would attempt to make the 
security laws, and the SENIS in particular, an issue in the 
upcoming elections if the GOP approved the reforms, and that 
he believed it could tip the balance in the elections away 
from the PRD. 
 
¶8.  (C) Mauro Zuniga told PolOff August 12 that the proposed 
reforms would "create a monster," and that the secrecy the 
law granted to the operations of the SENIS would lead to a 
large increase in drug trafficking, as under Noriega. In a 
theme that has been repeated by almost all the SENIS's 
critics, Zuniga accused the GOP of attempting to recreate the 
feared G-2 intelligence service of Noriega's time. Zuniga, 
and many of the other opposition leaders, was a direct victim 
of the G-2. Zuniga said he believed that the laws would 
contribute to "instability," as they indicated that the GOP 
was planning to deal with potential social protests 
associated with the sharp rise in food prices (see Ref B), 
through violence and repression. Miguel Bernal echoed this 
idea in an August 21 meeting with PolOff. He predicted that 
there would be a social explosion in Panama soon, and that 
the SENIS was the GOP's way of responding to that threat. He 
said the worst thing about the SENIS was that it was 
preventative. (Note: Bernal was referring to preventative 
wiretapping power the first version of the bill gave the 
SENIS, but which dropped out of the version which was 
approved. End Note) He said that preventive cases would give 
SENIS agents great latitude to bring false investigations to 
obtain information for real blackmailing or political 
espionage. 
 
¶9.  (C)  Javier Martinez Acha, former Executive Secretary of 
the CSPDN under President Torrijos, told PolOff August 18 
that the proposal was far too broad and did not do enough to 
prevent political abuse. He said that people were right to 
suspect that the SENIS would be used for political espionage, 
as the CSPDN has always been used for political espionage. 
Martinez specifically accused current CSPDN Executive 
Secretary Erick Espinosa of having engaged in political and 
even personal, espionage. Martinez said a law was needed to 
limit the authority of the SENIS, but that this law was badly 
written (referring to the original proposal), and did not 
adequately differentiate from true international threats to 
Panama, and potential local threats to the government. He 
said he believed Julio Lopez Borrero, a Spanish intelligence 
agent working for President Torrijos, was behind the law, and 
that his influence was negative for Panama, and U.S. 
interests. Spanish DCM Miguel Moro told PolCouns August 20 
that the proposed SENIS law did track similar Spanish 
legislation very closely, and that Lopez was making things 
very difficult for the Embassy. He denied Martinez's claim 
that Lopez was still actively working for the Spanish 
Government, though he acknowledged that Lopez was accredited 
to the GOP as a counselor of the Spanish Embassy.  Moro 
professed that the Spanish Embassy had little contact with 
Lopez and was visibly uncomfortable by the position Lopez's 
activities had placed the GOS. 
 
----- 
SENAN 
----- 
 
¶10.  (C)  Decree Law Number Seven creates the National 
Aero-Naval Service (SENAN), by fusing the National Air 
Service (SAN) and the National Maritime Service (SMN). The 
law lays out the internal regulations for the SENAN and seems 
to be largely consistent with a Coast Guard like 
law-enforcement agency. The SENAN is created to replace a SAN 
without operational airplanes or helicopters, and a SMN with 
serious operations deficiencies (see Ref C).  Abad said that 
the SENAN was necessary because Panama was too small to 
maintain two separate services, while having to patrol twice 
as much area offshore as onshore. Danilo Toro, Director 
General of the Ministry of Government and Justice's Integral 
Security Program, told PolOff August 11 that the creation of 
the SENAN would require a total reorganization of the 
structures, models and staff of the existing SAN and SMN, and 
would lead to the disappearance of these organizations, not 
just their merger. Minister of Government and Justice Daniel 
Delgado told Deputy SouthCom Commander Lt. Gen. Spears August 
21 that the GOP was working on a $50 million budget 
allocation to buy more equipment for the SENAN, including the 
refurbishing of seven helicopters, and the training of ten 
helicopter pilots. 
 
¶11.  (C) The SENAN proposal has drawn the least opposition of 
the five laws.  Ebrahim Asvat, President of La Estrella de 
Panama daily that has taken a strong editorial line against 
the reforms, told the CD-UP Forum that the creation of the 
SENAN was an attempt to re-militarize services (SAN and SMN) 
that had only failed to perform adequately because they had 
been starved of resources. Bernal asked rhetorically why 
Panama needed a coast guard if it already had the U.S. Coast 
Guard patrolling its waters under the Salas-Becker Agreement 
(See Ref C). Martinez called the SENAN proposal "empty 
posturing" unless serious financial resources were put into 
building an operational service. 
 
--------- 
SENAFRONT 
--------- 
 
¶12.  (C)  Decree Law Number Eight creates the National 
Frontier Service (SENAFRONT) to patrol Panama's frontiers. 
This law actually takes an existing unit of the PNP, called 
the National Frontier Directorate (DINAFRONT), and spins it 
off into a separate unit. The DINAFRONT is a de-facto 
para-military unit. Abad, the former head of the PTJ, said 
there were many administrative reasons why breaking the 
DINAFRONT off made sense, including ending the practice of 
transferring the para-military DINAFRONT troops to temporary 
street duty in Panama City, for which they are ill-prepared. 
Toro stressed the danger the increasingly disorganized and 
chaotic FARC represented to Panama's security and stability, 
as Colombian pressure continues to break the organization 
apart. He pointed to the chaos caused in Guatemala and El 
Salvador after the de-militarized guerrillas and soldiers 
turned to crime at the end of their respective civil wars. He 
said a defeated FARC was a greater danger to Panama than a 
strong and disciplined FARC, and Panama needed to get control 
of the Darien before that threat manifested itself. Abad, 
when speaking to the CD-UP Forum, called into question 
Panama's ability to do that, saying that turning SENAFRONT 
into a real deterrent would be too expensive, and calling on 
the Darien to be internationalized. 
 
¶13.  (C)  Opposition to the SENAFRONT proposal has been 
sharp. Zuniga called the SENAFRONT a "mini-army," (Note: 
Panama's constitution does not allow for the creation of an 
army. End Note) that was not justified by the threat posed by 
the increasingly weak FARC. This argument was repeated by 
Eisenmann, who said development would be a much more 
effective tool for controlling the Darien. Asvat told A/DCM 
August 15 that the creation of the SENAFRONT would lead to 
greater insecurity as the likelihood of a confrontation with 
the FARC grows.  Domingo Latorraca, former Vice-Minister of 
Economy and former head of the Chamber of Commerce, told 
PolOff August 26 that the SENAFRONT was clearly 
unconstitutional, as the constitution only allowed for the 
creation of "temporary" frontier forces, and the SENAFRONT 
was called permanent in the recently passed law. 
 
----------- 
PNP and SPI 
----------- 
 
¶14.  (C)  Decree Law Number Five contains just one article, 
that modifies the 1997 Organic Law of the PNP, in that it 
allows the Director of the PNP to be a civilian with a 
university degree, or a Police Officer of the highest rank, 
Commissioner. Minister Delgado said that he hoped that this 
change would lead to an improvement in morale and 
effectiveness in the PNP. The Acting Director, Jaime Ruiz, is 
already a Commissioner, and he is likely to be confirmed in 
the position.  Martinez told PolOff that the idea of changing 
this law had come straight from President Torrijos, and had 
been his position since before he was elected. Martinez 
defended the measure, on the condition that the head of the 
PNP be forced to retire after each presidential period, to 
prevent he or she from accruing so much power they could 
unduly influence the elected government. 
 
¶15.  (C)  Maytin attacked this proposal because it undermined 
the consensus reached by a national dialogue in 1997 when the 
Organic Law of the PNP was passed. That law re-certified the 
practice since the return of democracy that the PNP should 
always be led by a civilian. Much of the debate about this 
law has revolved around the argument about the advantages and 
disadvantages of having a "military officer" in charge of the 
PNP, given that the law allows for a uniformed PNP officer to 
head the PNP. Latorraca noted that most of the senior PNP 
leadership have been trained in military academies, and not 
police academies. 
 
¶16.  (C)  Organic Law Number 6 also allows a uniformed 
officer to run the Institutional Protection Service (SPI), 
and makes a number of other administrative changes. It has 
been the least commented law, though the "militarization" of 
the leadership has been criticized. Maytin has publicly 
criticized the increase in the number of body guards for 
ex-presidents to 12, but it has not been an important part of 
the debate. 
 
------------------------- 
It's all the Gringos' Fault 
------------------------- 
 
¶17.  (C)  A recurring theme in the opposition to the security 
laws has been the attempt to link the reform proposals to the 
USG. Asvat at the CD-UP Forum said that the announcement of 
"Plan Merida" and the security reforms in July was no 
coincidence. He said that the security reforms aimed to 
create an army to fight the U.S.'s wars on drugs and 
terrorism. Several other opposition supporters in the 
audience of the Forum also voiced strong suspicions that the 
ultimate inspiration for the proposals was the USG. Zuniga 
has written several op-ed pieces in local papers accusing the 
USG of being behind the proposals. Latorraca said the groups 
opposed to the laws could be broken into two groups; the 
first, led by many of those who suffered under the 
dictatorship first hand, holds the more emotional and radical 
position that these laws are part of a U.S.-led conspiracy, 
and consitute an immediate threat to Panama's democracy; the 
second group is concerned that the changes in the security 
services constitute a long term threat to Panama's democracy, 
leaving it vulnerable to a military take over in the future. 
The anti-American arguments have been strongest among the 
former group, and are based on their understanding of the 
U.S. role leading up to the Omar Torrijos dictatorship, and 
our relationship to Noriega. An unfortunate series of 
coincidences, including Minister Delgado's visit to the U.S. 
in July at Secretary of Defense Gates' request, and the 
announcement of the Merida Initiative in July, has provided 
the lines that the opposition has been able to connect to 
find a U.S. hand behind the reforms. 
 
--------------------------------- 
Will Security Become Politicized? 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶18.  (C)  The opposition parties are still coming to grips 
with how best to respond to the protests surrounding these 
reforms. While Ricardo Martinelli, the Presidential candidate 
of the Democratic Change-Patriotic Union alliance (CD-UP), 
has come out publicly in the press saying he would repeal the 
laws, no party officials spoke at the CD-UP Forum.  On 
September 2, Panamenista Presidential candidate Juan Carlos 
Varela raised the specter of "militarization" and rejected 
the security reform laws on two grounds; process, lamenting 
inadequate consultation and slamming the Torrijos 
Administration for its "undemocratic" tendencies; and 
substance, stating that the laws were unnecessary, failed to 
meet average Panamanians' immediate security concerns and 
constituted a threat to democracy. PRD presidential candidate 
Balbina Herrera, who is likely to win the PRD primary on 
September 7, told PolCouns on August 22 that she was 
"furious" with the way Torrijos "mismanaged the security 
laws. "They (the Torrijos Administration) painted a target on 
my back, and created a political campaign issue where none 
existed before," lamented Herrera. Civil society groups 
marched on the National Assembly on September 3 to protest 
these laws. 
 
------- 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶19.  (C)  The GOP's effort to reform its security services is 
long overdue. The SAN and SMN in particular, suffer from 
major problems, which gravely affects their ability to 
effectively cooperate with the U.S. in the anti-drug effort. 
Only the wholesale reform Toro talks about will really make a 
difference, however, as the SMN in particular does not suffer 
from a lack of resources, but rather from corruption and 
extremely poor leadership. A robust coast guard is far more 
in line with the country's needs rather than a pretend navy 
and pretend air force. Creating an effective coast guard will 
require, as Martinez pointed out, massive resources to really 
make a difference. SENAFRONT is also a long overdue and 
worthwhile endeavor, as Panama has real problems exerting 
effective government control in the Darien, and an 
operational border force can only help. The U.S. should 
engage in the process of buiding up the SENAN and SENAFRONT, 
but only after two conditions are met: 1) we get clear 
evidence that the kind of needed personnel and cultural 
reforms are taking place within these instutions; 2) we are 
sure that the reforms are not being implemented in any way 
that might undermine democracy, accountability, human rights 
and the rule of law in Panama. The complaints about U.S. 
involvement in the militarization of the SENAN and SENAFRONT 
could be met by designating DHS assets, such as Coast Guard, 
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and Customs and 
Border Protection (CBP) to take the lead on assistance 
efforts, rather than only having Department of Defense led 
military training and assistance. The other three laws, 
SENIS, PNP and SPI, are not as significant for USG 
cooperation. The SENIS law is about bringing something hidden 
into the open, and will probably not effect our cooperation 
much, while the PNP and SPI laws are purely internal matters. 
If they improve operational effectiveness, as Minister 
Delgado hopes, so much the better. 
 
¶20.  (C)  That said, the GOP's public handling of this issue 
has been an absolute disaster. Many of these reforms, such as 
the SENAN and the SENAFRONT, would have been relatively 
uncontroversial if the case had been made in public as to why 
they were necessary. Others, such as the SENIS and the 
modification of the law allowing officers to run the PNP and 
SPI, should never have been attempted without getting wide 
public buy-in through some sort of consensus-building 
mechanism. It has become increasingly clear as this debate 
has developed that the wounds of the Noriega era have not 
fully healed. While the GOP has succeeded in passing the 
laws, that was never really the issue. The real test was to 
get public support so the changes would become 
institutionalized, and a new security structure could be 
built upon them. Instead, the SENIS is likely to cast a pall 
upon all the reforms, turning them into a political 
opportunity too good for the opposition to pass up. As a 
result the leaders of the new security organizations must now 
work to implement the changes, knowing that they may be 
undone by the incoming administration. Worse for the U.S., 
the debate risks casting U.S. security cooperation with 
Panama in a partisan light, which is not beneficial to the 
USG, or to Panama. For this reason, the Embassy is working 
hard to separate the long term U.S. security cooperation 
relationship with Panama from the debate surrounding these 
laws.  While we will not go out of our way to comment, 
when/if we must take a public position, we will say that an 
issue as important as security reform needs the buy-in a 
full, democratic vetting would give it, and we will reject 
the false dichotomy of security or democracy, insisting that 
the best security solutions are always anchored in democracy. 
STEPHENSON