By ANDRES OPPENHEIMER
Herald Staff Writer
PANAMA -- A week before Panama's May 2 elections, government-backed
front-runner Martin Torrijos -- the son of a former populist president
-- seems
to be losing ground based on a new poll, which shows him in a virtual
tie with
his closest rival.
Torrijos, the 35-year-old son of the late president Gen. Omar Torrijos,
has
been enjoying a comfortable eight-point lead in the polls for several
months,
but the new poll suggests that a last-minute rally by Mireya Moscoso
-- the
widow of four-time president Arnulfo Arias -- could threaten his chances.
The poll released Wednesday by the daily La Prensa shows Moscoso leading
with 41 percent of the vote, followed by Torrijos with 39 percent,
and
businessman Alberto Vallarino in a distant third place with 14 percent.
The
poll of 1,800 people has a 2 percent margin of error, which turns it
into a
technical tie, the newspaper said.
All three candidates vow to maintain excellent relations with the United
States
following the transfer of the Panama Canal and the withdrawal of the
last U.S.
troops from this country Dec. 31. But opposition politicians say a
victory by
the ruling Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD), by increasing that
party's
hold on power, would make it difficult to achieve a system of checks
and
balances to crack down on corruption.
With the exception of President Guillermo Endara's term immediately
following
the 1989 U.S. invasion of Panama, the Torrijos-inspired PRD has been
in
power since the late 1960s.
A bid for change
Critics say it enjoys too cozy a relationship with the country's big
businesses,
and has recently appointed six of the Supreme Court's nine members.
Not
surprisingly, Moscoso -- who campaigns under her first name -- has
plastered
the city with campaign posters proclaiming, ``Mireya es el Cambio,''
or
``Mireya brings change.''
Torrijos, who graduated from Texas A&M University with degrees in
political
science and economy, served as vice minister of interior under President
Ernesto Perez Balladares and is widely seen as an affable young man
who
didn't make waves during his tenure in government. Making the most
of his
youth, he campaigns as ``the candidate of the future.''
His biggest asset is his last name, friends and adversaries say, because
the
Dec. 31 transfer of the Panama Canal would have additional emotional
overtones if the United States delivered the canal to the son of the
president
who negotiated the 1978 Panama Canal treaties. Under the treaties,
the
United States has to turn over the canal and withdraw its troops by
2000.
``I have a double challenge, as a Panamanian and as my father's son,
to
demonstrate that the canal will be managed by Panama with the same
efficiency, or even more, than when it was in American hands,'' Torrijos
said in
an interview this week.
There are two factors accounting for Moscoso's last-minute rally, political
analysts say: a growing disenchantment with the government in the countryside
and increased emigration of votes from the other opposition candidate,
as it
becomes increasingly evident that he remains a distant third.
Regional differences
While Panama City is dotted with giant construction cranes building
luxury
hotels and highways, people in other parts of the country say the capital's
signs
of prosperity have not reached the countryside. ``It's going to be
a very tight
election,'' said Roberto Eisenmann, a former newspaper publisher and
president of the Latin American Journalism Center, a Panama-based
educational foundation. ``It can go either way.''
Despite Torrijos' slip in the new poll, his top aides pointed to a massive
car
caravan April 18 in support of the candidate as evidence of grass-roots
support for him. The caravan was the largest in the country's history,
comprising 45,000 cars, according to Torrijos campaign aides and Transit
Police estimates.
But Moscoso's campaign dismissed the pro-Torrijos caravan as a
government-imposed chore for public employees. Asked about it, one
Moscoso aide shrugged, ``Cars don't vote.''
Copyright 1999 Miami Herald