Roberto Eisenmann Story - US Occupancy, the Panama Canal, and Panama's Future

For installment three of our interview with Roberto Eisenmann, we return to the time of the US occupancy in Panama and discuss with Mr. Eisenmann how he views the current Panama's future now that the US military no longer occupies his country.  If you ask Mr. Eisenmann how he looks at Panama now as opposed to twenty years ago, he says, “It is a different country.”

Eisenmann states, “Another thing that changed Panama immensely was the treaty.”  (The Torrijos-Carter Treaty of September 7, 1977.) “Here was the world power negotiating with a small, third world country. We were lucky that Carter had it as one of his foreign policy priorities. We were able to negotiate a treaty that didn't satisfy either of the two parties but was a furthering of the relationship.”

Eisenmann describes a Panama far different from what we all know now. At the time there were fourteen US military bases in Panama.  And, in addition to these bases, the Canal Zone, itself, was a fenced-in enclosure right down the middle of the country. That meant that there were not only US military living here but US civilians as well. Eisenmann believes that the non-military Americans who were living here then had, what he would consider, an unfortunate colonial mentality. He feels he can say this as he went to school in the Canal Zone and had family members there who would hear Americans stating that after residing in Panama for some thirty years, they were still very proud not to know any Spanish! 

To clarify his point he says, “That didn't happen with the military. The military that came down here were mixed. Soldiers want to go out and party, and they want to meet people, but the civilian employees of the canal were really difficult people.” 

According to Mr. Eisenmann, the civilian employees, predominantly from the southern part of the United States, carried a segregationist attitude as well as a nationalistic attitude with them. He gives the example of his wife working in the Canal Zone and car pooling with a Panamanian employee who was also a US citizen. The US citizen had a civil service job and the Panamanian, his wife, worked for half the salary on the same job.

Though the treaty was good for Panama, the time surrounding the departure of the US military was not good. “It was a really terrible situation,” says Mr. Eisenmann, “but we were able to solve that with no violence. That was important. Then came the demilitarization. That was a little more difficult. The Pentagon finally decided that the Panama Canal was not a major security problem for the United States.” 
 
He describes this time as highly emotional for both countries. Taking down the US flag was difficult for Americans as many leftist Panamanians were battling by stating, “Get the gringos out of the country!” On the other hand, those in the business sector understood the benefits of keeping the Americans here. 

The Canal, itself, has been a tremendous success for the US and for Panama. Eisenmann describes a time when he took an American to visit the Canal.  The gentleman had never seen the Canal before, and after a VIP tour, the man made the comment, “The Panama Canal has to be the biggest foreign policy success for the USA, and no one knows about it up there. We actually negotiated with a small country and were able to get it done, and the small country is doing a better job of running the canal than we were.”

During a speech he gave to the Panama American Association on this topic, he compared Panama to a teenage son who needs to leave home but is ambivalent. Once he has left, the relationship immediately improves with his father. He stated that Panama needed to grow up and become its own country. An American attacked him on the subject and stated that he felt secure living in Panama because of the military bases. Fast forward to a few months ago to the time when the two men met again at a conference in Panama, and the American apologized to Mr. Eisenmann telling him that he had been right all along. 

When discussing the outlook for Panama in light of the economic slowdown, he comments, “It remains to be seen how hard hit we are going to be with this crisis. I think we are going to be hit a lot less than the US, but I think we are going to be hit, no doubt.” He says that perhaps the economic slowdown is a blessing in disguise as Panama was “growing out of proportion” before the slowdown.  The country's infrastructure was way behind its development, and he speculates that perhaps Panama will see more parks and rational development.

Talk then turned to what Roberto Eisenmann saw and felt needed to happen for Panama in the future. “Obviously we all hope that Panama will someday become a first world nation. There are examples out there, like Singapore,” Eisenmann said. “You don’t have to be a big country to make it. And, we have a lot of things to correct to become a first world country.”

Eisenmann uses the example of the Canal when he says, “Panama needs to elevate the country to the level of [the administration of] the Canal. It’s an example we have in the midst of our country run by Panamanians.” Eisenmann says that the Canal administration is, in fact, doing a good job and that “we have been able to isolate it in the political realm.” He believes that with the new president being a past administrator of the Canal, he knows how the Canal operates, and based on this, he should be able to make some changes to elevate the country.  As well, he believes that the government requires more efficiency and needs to respond to the needs of the people.  
 
“The level of poverty in Panama is a scandal,” Eisenmann says. “I don’t sleep well thinking of it. I think that this is a rich country with a lot of poor people. That is not good.” He realizes that a lot of things need to change, especially mentalities. “We now have a government of elites,” he says.  To further elaborate on this, he cites the fact that the elite are not paying the taxes they should be and gives the example of people doing business in the Colon Free Zone but not paying taxes on total profits of $1.5 billion. Change needs to come, and he definitely believes that change can be accomplished.  

“This is a small country with small problems. This is not Brazil. This is a country of three million people.” 

End of installment 3