Partisan Defense Committee Letter

24 June 2025

Partisan Defense Committee P.O. Box 99, Canal Street Station, New York, NY 10013

email: partisandefense@earthlink.net   www.partisandefense.org

Contact: Kevin Gilroy (212) 406-4252

The following letter was written by the Partisan Defense Committee.

Ambassador José Miguel Alemán Healy
Embassy of Panama
2862 McGill Terrace, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20008
info@embassyofpanama.org

We write to protest the arrest of Francisco Smith and Gilberto Guerra, leaders of the Panama farm workers union Sitraibana. We demand their immediate release and that all charges be dropped.

For six weeks since late April, Smith and Guerra were at the head of a strike of banana workers against Chiquita in Changuinola, Bocas del Toro province. The strike brought the region's banana industry to a halt, and was joined by teachers, construction workers and peasants and indigenous peoples in protest of the hated Law 462 which privatizes the country's social security system and guts retirement. The protests also took aim at the sale of the country to large imperialist enterprises, mostly American.

The Sitraibana strike ended June 11, after the National Assembly agreed to restore workers' pension and labor benefits. But just days later the union leaders were arrested on bogus charges of crimes against public safety, damaging public infrastructure, and disrupting public order. President José Raúl Mulino has also vowed that none of the banana workers will get their jobs back. Since then, the government has suspended civil liberties and arrested dozens of other protesters. This is a calculated attack not just on Sitraibana but on anyone who would fight the imperialist rape of Panama.

We say: Drop the charges! Free Smith and Guerra! Hands off Sitraibana and all those who took part in the protests against Law 462! Restore all civil liberties!

Sincerely,

Jonathan Piper