PANAMA CITY: Conservative Juan Carlos Varela called for a national unity government after winning Panama’s presidential election on Sunday, easily defeating President Ricardo Martinelli’s hand-picked successor.
Varela, Panama’s vice-president and a former Martinelli supporter, won a clear majority — 39 percent — of the vote, Panama’s Electoral Tribunal said, with 80 percent of polling stations reporting.
Varela was the surprise winner in a three-way race. The final results put him seven percentage points ahead of his nearest rival, Martinelli loyalist Jose Domingo Arias.
The new administration will be “a humane government, a government of consensus, a government of national unity,” Varela said in a victory speech to hundreds of supporters. Varela also promised that politics in Panama “will change from being a business to a service,” he said, a reference to allegations of corruption under Martinelli.
During his campaign Varela also vowed to curb Panama’s four percent inflation by imposing price controls, a policy commonly associated with leftist governments.
The president-elect is a 50-year-old rum manufacturer, fervent Catholic and member of the conservative Opus Dei religious group.
Martinelli and the now president-elect had a bitter falling out in 2011, when Varela was fired from his job as foreign minister — which he held along with the vice-presidency — and Arias, a former housing minister and a businessman, was appointed instead.
Arias promised “constructive opposition” as he conceded defeat. A third candidate, former Panama City mayor Juan Carlos Navarro, also conceded.
AFP
