Mayor Bosco’s future rests with Supreme Court

The political future of Panama city’s problem plagued mayor, Bosco Vallarino, rests with Panama’s  Supreme Court.

If he loses his job, it will not be because of numerous blunders, but because he renounced his Panamanian citizenship in 2000.

Judge Alberto Cigarruista  has circulated a draft memorandum on two of the three lawsuits filed against the constitutionality of Resolution No. 2 of the Assembly, July 3, 2009, which allowed the mayor to resume Panamanian citizenship.
Justice sources said yesterday that two of these cases have been sitting in the office of Cigarruista, and the third has not been dealt with.
The first lawsuit was filed on May 14, 2010 by attorney Armando Aguilar, the second by the constitutional lawyer Miguel Antonio Bernal, on behalf of Mario Castillo, July 23, 2010, and the third by lawyer Roberto Calvera Saks Gold on July 1, 2011.
Aguilar  and Bernal argue that the Assembly resolution flagrantly violated Article 46 of the Constitution because Vallarino lost his citizenship in 2000, when he renounced it to acquire U.S. citizenship. The resolution allowed Vallarino participate and eventually win the elections for the district capital.
The article cited by counsel states that "laws are not retroactive, except those of public or social interest and when it is expressed."
According to Aguilar, Vallarino restore citizenship to the Assembly applied retroactively  and thereby violated the constitution.
Bernal said he also violated due process.
If the above resolution was declared unconstitutional, the Panamenista bastions in terms of appointment  If it Party  loses the mayor's office, it would then be taken over by the Martinelli CD party, The Mayoralty  is one of the last bastions of Panamenistas in terms of appointments.
Bernal and Aguilar told La Prensa that they have been informed unofficially that the draft endorses the position to declare unconstitutional the act of the Assembly, but this has not been confirmed.
 In September 2010, the then deputy prosecutor Giuseppe Bonissi, a  Martinelli appointment, gave his opinion that the resolution was not unconstitutional.