Panama, November 4 (EFE).- The Government of Panama on Saturday requested the “opening” of the roads, as there are blockages in different points following the anti-mining protests, which has led to food shortages , medicines and gasoline in certain regions of the country, as well as “the return of social peace”.

“After the sanction by the President of the Republic, Laurentino Cortizo Cohen, of the Mining Moratorium Law and pending the judgment of the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ); where, we reiterate that the priority is that of this state body, respecting its independence as such, we ask for the opening of the roads at the national level and the return to the social peace that the Panamanian population needs “, indicates a press release from the Ministry of Government.

This official letter adds that “when there are conflicts and differences in a society, when the people demand positions and a peaceful solution is found, by achieving the goal, we achieve social peace. The people have been heard!

On the Pan-American Highway, the country’s main highway that connects it from north to south, there are blockages in some areas, according to reports from social media users.

Call for “free transport”

Professional associations also demanded the opening of roads, demanding the “right of free transit”, because in some regions of the country there are shortages of food, gasoline and medicine, mainly in the interior provinces. .

And the Ombudsman’s Office urged “leaders to consider freeing up pathways to ensure access to the right to health and food security without prejudice to peaceful protests” in the face of the “unsuccessful results of creating humanitarian corridors for the passage of food, medicine”. and medical supplies at the various closure points.

“Food, fuel and medicine are lacking, we still have four medicine trucks. We have people including the elderly, boys and girls, teenagers stuck on the road, the right to free movement, loss of school, many other things,” wrote the mediator, Eduardo Leblanc, on the social network X (formerly Twitter).

Additionally, social media has been flooded with messages calling for at least one humanitarian corridor for the rapid passage of these essential supplies.

The Social Security Fund (Social Security) of Panama announced today that in collaboration with the National Aeronautical Service, “an emergency humanitarian air corridor for the transfer of supplies” has been established to “save the lives of patients hospitalized in Chiriquí and Bocas del Toro”, two border areas with Costa Rica.

And he added that “around 9,000 kilos of equipment” for “hemodialysis” were transported to these provinces, which only meets the needs of a few days.”

Unions will continue to take to the streets

The “Alliance” for the united people, which brings together several unions, including the powerful Suntrac, announced that it would maintain “the street actions, the patriotic and civic mobilizations which have been undertaken with each of the characteristics of each organized sector” to the point of “repealing” the mining contract.

For almost two weeks, Panama has been going through an internal crisis with demonstrations against a controversial mining contract, the most massive in recent decades, and blockages on the country’s main roads, which keep the country semi-paralyzed.

The protests are against the contract law that renews a 20-year extendable concession to Minera Panamá, a subsidiary of the Canadian company First Quantum Minerals, to exploit the largest open-cast copper mine in Central America.

From now on, the future of this mining contract is in the hands of the Supreme Court of Justice, which must declare whether it is unconstitutional or not after Parliament gave up on repealing it through a bill.

This Saturday, a small group of demonstrators organized a vigil with graffiti in the street and candles in the premises of the Tribunal to put pressure on this judicial body to rule on the mining contract.

Environmentalists and lawyers say a ruling of unconstitutionality by the Court, the highest judicial body, would put the state in a more advantageous position in the face of a possible international lawsuit brought by the mining company for breach of contract.

On Friday, a mining moratorium law was enacted, which prohibits the granting of new metal mining concessions and rejects current ones, which was one of the protesters’ demands.