PANAMA CITY, May 6 (NNN-AGENCIES) — José Raúl Mulino, the stand-in candidate for disqualified former President Ricardo Martinelli, was on a path to victory in Panama’s presidential election Sunday night as his three closest rivals conceded.
The 64-year-old former security minister had nearly 35% of the vote, giving him a nine-point lead over other candidates. He was in line to take over leadership of a Central American country with pressing challenges and simmering discontent.
Martinelli, a firebrand politician who was barred from running after being sentenced to 10 years in prison for money laundering, threw his support behind Mulino, a 64-year-old former security minister who replaced him on the ballot as the candidate for the Achieving Goals and Alliance parties.
While lacking his ally’s charisma, Mulino coasted on Martinelli’s popularity and the booming economy seen under the former leader, who is currently holed up in the Nicaraguan Embassy, where he has sought asylum.
Mulino has promised to help Martinelli with his legal woes if he wins, usher in a new wave of economic prosperity, and stop historic levels of migration through the Darien Gap. He will also have to face the economic aftermath of mass protests last year and a drought that is handicapping the Panama Canal.
Panama’s next president faces an uphill battle, on the economy especially. Last year, the Central American nation was roiled for weeks by mass anti-government demonstrations, which came to encapsulate deeper discontent among citizens.
The protests targeted a government contract with a copper mine, which critics said endangered the environment and water at a time when drought has gotten so bad that it has effectively handicapped trade transit through the Panama Canal.
While many celebrated in November when the country’s Supreme Court declared the contract unconstitutional, the mine closure, the recent slowdown of economic growth and slashed Canal transit will put Panama’s new leader in a tight spot. — NNN-AGENCIES
