![]() “Panamanians are suffering from lack of water, suffering from droughts, principally in the central provinces, animals that die, harvests that don’t happen,” environmental activist Martita Cornejo told CNN en Español. The protestors accuse the government of selling off the nation’s natural resources at the same moment many Panamanians have been hit with the costs of rising inflation and are feeling the impacts of climate change. Opposition to the mine has united environmentalists, indigenous groups and teachers’ and construction unions who see allegations of backroom dealings between the government and the mining company as further evidence of widespread official corruption. ![]() Panama’s government has promised, however, that the mine will bring thousands of jobs in addition to the badly needed revenue. First Quantum Minerals did not respond to CNN’s request for comment on the protests.Ī march against the government contract with Canadian mining company First Quantum and its subsidiary Minera Panama in Panama City on November 3, 2023. The contract allows Canada’s First Quantum Minerals to restart an open-pit copper mine surrounded by rain forest for the next 20 years, with the possibility of extending for another 20 years.Įnvironmentalists say the mine could contaminate drinking water and devastate tracts of the 32,000 acres the company negotiated use of, in exchange for yearly payments of $375 million. The unusual scene of violence is the latest flashpoint in some of the largest protests to hit the Central American nation since Panamanians flooded the streets en masse to demonstrate against the dictatorship of Manuel Noriega in the 1980s.įor weeks, tens of thousands of protestors have vented their fury at a controversial mining contract given to Minera Panama, the local subsidiary of a Canadian mining company, to extract copper, a key component in electric car batteries. ![]() Panama’s National Police later said they arrested the suspected gunman at the scene of the shooting. Anti-mining protests that have roiled Panama for the last two weeks turned deadly on Tuesday when a man allegedly shot and killed two demonstrators, according to police.Ī chilling video posted by bystanders on X, formerly known as Twitter, showed a disheveled elderly man apparently frustrated with the logjam trying to force the protestors to remove a barrier blocking the Pan American highway about 50 miles south of the capital, before pulling out a pistol and opening fire. ![]()
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