Donald J. Trump’s mania with the Panama Canal comes from a long time ago. It precedes by decades his recent outbursts against the “high cost” paid by the ships that transit it or the accusation that the Chinese control it.
In 2011, the businessman sought the presidential nomination for the first time by participating in the Republican party primaries. He was one of the dozen candidates in a competition won by Mitt Romney, the Utah senator who tried to stop Barak Obama’s re-election.
Trump’s candidacy, which according to polls at the time was at the bottom of voting intentions, took flight when he tied himself to the hoax that catapulted him: he accused Obama of not having been born in the United States. In March of that year, in an interview on ABC, he stated that he was not an American by birth and, therefore, could not be a candidate, much less president. That same month he denounced, this time on CNN, that returning the administration of the canal to Panama had been stupid since the United States “had not received anything in return,” that it had been a terrible deal and that the Americans had been scammed.
His reckless accusations, that of a president born in Africa and that of a tiny country taking advantage of American power, captivated the most extreme vote of the Republican right to such an extent that Trump rose to third place in the polls. By May, however, his candidacy was collapsing. President Obama, who had previously remained silent about such falsehoods, loaded with racist overtones, upon seeing that the hoax was beginning to penetrate the electorate, decided to publish a copy of his birth certificate.
Those first conspiracy theories disseminated in 2011, which served to launch his political career, evidently fell on fertile ground. That year Trump visited Panama. The country was so attractive that it opened the first of its hotels abroad. “I think the hotel is truly magnificent,” Trump said during the opening of the 70-story building in the nation’s capital that he had just accused of taking advantage of his own. Very much in his style, he boasted that reserves were already through the roof. “Everyone wants to be here and it’s really going to be a tremendous success.”
The extinction of the “Canal Zone”, the transfer of the administration of the interoceanic waterway and the closure of the military bases that operated on the Panamanian isthmus, not only constituted an act of justice and the end of one of the darkest chapters of American imperialism, but they represented one of the most notable triumphs of modern diplomacy and international law.
Thus, a centuries-old controversy was settled and an alliance was forged to guarantee an open channel for global trade. The Treaty Concerning the Neutrality and Operation of the Panama Canal is the legal instrument in force between both nations. More than 40 countries have joined it, including European powers, Russia, Japan and Latin America. Through it, the neutrality of the Canal was declared so that, both in times of peace and in times of war, it remains open to the peaceful transit of the ships of all nations on terms of complete equality, “so that there is no contravention.” no nation discriminates concerning the conditions or costs of transit.”
The demands for reductions in the toll in favor of the United States made by the president-elect directly contradict the treaty with which his country committed itself to the international community and which was ratified with the favorable vote of two thirds of the Senate at that time. .
Panama had barely finished taking full control of the canal when it began an ambitious program of modernization and expansion. The mega-project completed in 2016 by Panama is, in practical terms, a second canal, significantly increasing the number and size of ships that pass through it. 13,000 ships cross the waterway annually, from all flags in the world, connecting 1,920 ports.
And yes, 74% of the cargo that crosses the isthmus of Panama has its origin or destination in the United States. In a very distant second place are the ships that set sail or return to China, then those from Japan, South Korea and Chile. A canal managed by Panamanian workers and pilots, on Panamanian lands, for whose supply gigantic natural reserves have been established that guarantee the 200 million liters of fresh water consumed by each transit.
Speaking of money, it is true that the United States financed the construction of the Canal, and that its ingenuity managed to overcome the enormous challenges of splitting the isthmus in two, and that the work led to the tragic death of thousands of people, not the “58,000 Americans.” as the president-elect says, but about 6,000, the vast majority of whom were Afro-Antilleans imported for the work, not Americans. It is also true, however, that during the 85 years that the canal operated under American control, it more than recovered its investment, paying a paltry annuity to Panama, not to mention the military advantages that its dominance conferred on its path to become the great military power of the 20th century.
What is the next leader of the United States looking for with this tantrum? Impossible to know with certainty. Panama will complete 25 years in control of the canal, facing the challenges of climate change in the same way as it did with the expansion project, with rates that guarantee its adequate maintenance, efficient operation, the preservation of water sources and a fair retribution to its owners, the Panamanians, despite the new president’s tantrums. This is how both countries agreed, when sanity still had some place between friendly nations.
