OPINION: Panama's recycled pharaohs

The dynamics of clientelistic politics facilitates the re-election of deputies, since, once installed in the Assembly, they negotiate and manage budgets with which they create a growing network of dependents, traffic influences, exchange favors with other organs of the State, develop business with advantage and pass laws that flirt with the voters of their circuits or favor their sponsors and donors. In short, they have a supermarket of options to pull to take hold in their seats, election after election. There are exceptions: some solitary plainsman  has passed through the hemicycle, bearer of ideas and principles, but most fit within the described pattern. The re-election, figure allowed by our Political Constitution for that of deputy and other positions of popular election, It has been abused, to the point that, instead of allowing the use of experiences, it has favored the proliferation of pharaohs and caciques for whom there should be no place in a democracy. There is a need for a constitutional reform that addresses this regrettable reality, but, meanwhile, citizens have a letter to play: it is called a vote.-LA PRENSA. Apr. 4