Panama: Former President Martinelli wins in primaries for new presidential candidacy

The former Panamanian president Ricardo Martinelli (2009-2014) won this Sunday the presidential candidacy of his party, Realizando Metas (RM), which held its internal primaries with a view to the general elections of May 2024, while he awaits a sentence in the trial for alleged laundering of public funds for the purchase of a media and implications in the scandal of payment of bribes by the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht.

The director of the electoral organization of the Electoral Tribunal (TE), Osman López, acknowledged the virtual triumph of the pre-candidate in a call, and highlighted the achievement of the result in less than two hours through the technological tool TER (Transmisión Extraoficial de Resultados), with more than 75 percent of the tables scrutinized.

Meanwhile, the electoral roll of the RM party for these primary elections was of 235,700 voters, distributed in 513 voting centers, all over the country, according to official information.

Martinelli, who became president with the Democratic Change (CD) party, which he also founded, denounced this Sunday during the act of this new proclamation that he has been for more than 10 years “victim of the use of the judicial power” to end his political career.

According to the former president, they are disrespecting his electoral criminal jurisdiction, “which was created so that the candidates could campaign, and not be persecuted by other politicians, nor that the judiciary be used for that purpose”.

He stated that, in this sense, he is allegedly the target of an impeachment trial, as the only way to proscribe him from the presidential race.

“The only way to remove me from the presidential race is with an impeachment trial (…) they are going to have to kill me (…) the laws or procedures are used as a weapon of war and with the sole purpose of disqualifying me as a presidential candidate, through rigged processes”, he harangued this same day at the headquarters of RM, where he celebrated with hundreds of supporters his expected victory.

Martinelli’s sons, Luis Enrique, and Ricardo Martinelli, were sent back to Panama last January after serving a three-year sentence imposed by the US justice, accused of laundering millions of dollars in bribes from Odebrecht.

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