Graffiti for the preservation of Panamas history

There was a time when when graffiti on the walls of the old lady of Balboa, the former U.S. Embassy, would have been  an act of desecration.

This weekend it became a symbol of preservation. Fifteen Panamanian activists who painted the  walls and fences and planted Panamanian flags were there not to desecrate the building, but to try to save it for it’s historical importance, and to add to the cultural identity of the city.{jathumbnail off}

Thed building, is soon to be torn down in the name of progress and it will be replaced with  a 70 story concrete, steel and glass  monument to government bureaucracy  the Financial Tower. 

Urgings by architects and engineers to preserve the building for any one of a multitude  of uses, from an annex for the adjacent overcrowded Santo Tomas Hospital, to a home for NGOs. And lately as a museum, sadly lacking in the countrys capital.

All has fallen on deaf ears, even though those worried about increasing government debt because of massive expenditure on needed infrastructures, have pointed out that there is no need for spending of millions of dollars for government offices in  a prime residential location.