The left-wing economist who aspires to the Executive of Panama with a feminist plan

The leftist Maribel Gordón, professor and economist by profession, aspires to the Presidency of Panama in the elections on May 5 with a Government plan based on social proposals for the “dignified life”, being the only candidate with a plan focused on equality policies.

“That is our approach, which incorporates women in decision-making and my main proposal is a national budget with a gender perspective”Gordón, an independent candidate, said in an interview with EFE that she is among the last places in all the polls, which she does not recognize and in which she borders on the 2% of voting intention.

In the opinion of the candidate, the State approves “dead (and) empty laws” with a gender perspective, because by not having sufficient resources to put them into practice, they only serve to wash the international image, “without any responsibility or desire for it to be executed.”

Gordon, 62 years old and popularly known as ‘The teacher’, She is the only candidate with openly socialist ideas and supported by part of the feminist movement in the Central American country by having a public discourse against sexist violence and equality gaps.

She considered herself part of the feminist revolution from a very early age, when who was still officially chosen to represent the movement: “I joined a group of 14 women who carried these flags because the gender inequality gaps in Panama are deep.”

He explained that in the country there are “low wages” for women because they are “placed in economic activities where the minimum wage predominates” because “The system does not generate decent employment for women.”

“We are also proposing an institutional policy that guarantees the elimination of violence against women (because) violence begins from the institutional level with a State that does not protect and that thinks that if a woman or an adolescent is raped it is something common or of private life”he pointed out.

The presidential candidate has a long history within social movements in Panama, but came to the public spotlight in the protests against the rising cost of life in 2021, when the prices of gasoline and other basic products skyrocketed due to global inflation.

His interventions – as if he were teaching a university class – during a frustrated dialogue table between the Government and the demonstrations to seek a solution were popularly applauded, thus forging his candidacy with his participation in the anti-mining protests last year, before which keeps his “No” resounding to mining in the country.

The “leftist candidate”

This is the third time that Gordon has tried to reach the spheres of the Executive Branch. The two previous times -2014 and 2019- she was a running mate with the leftist Broad Front for Democracy (FAD), the political arm of the most powerful union in the country and the one whose spectacular failure in the last elections caused the party to be dissolved.

Gordon is related to the sociopolitical movements of the Latin American left. A reflection of this is his Government project baptized as the ‘plan for a dignified life’, which is based on “human well-being”, “real democracy”, the “rescue of identity” and a constitutional reform through constituent means. , one of the two options allowed by the current Magna Carta.

“If the left is a failure, why are there economic sanctions against those leftist countries? (…) (Due to) the fear of a system that effectively works without blockages (…), at least, in matters of national and social development,” Gordon poses.

Thus, he proposes creating in Panama, a country “with its specific characteristics”a Proyect of “national and social development, which belongs to Panamanians for Panamanians” to which some can be incorporated “examples from other latitudes.”

He also defends that socialism, “that transition phase between capitalism and communism” that adapts to each historical moment, attempts have been made to “develop” in different ways, which is why the governments in China, Cuba and Venezuela, as well as what “it was attempted to be done in Boliviain Ecuador, Mexicoeven today in Colombia and Uruguay” They don’t look alike.

For the elections on May 5, just over 3 million Panamanians are called to the polls.

The main candidates are José Raúl Mulino, the running mate of the disqualified former president Ricardo Martinelli, for the Realizing Goals (RM) and Alianza parties, former president Martín Torrijos (2004-2009), for the Popular Party (PP) and Ricardo Lombana for the Another Path Movement.

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