In a legal analysis, lawyer Juan Carlos Arauz assured in a a recent article that the Civil Code was violated due to the pressures exerted so the main stockholder of GESA, Abdul Waked, sell the papers so they be ‘pardoned’ by the foreign administration.

Arauz explained that in several occasions he heard and read in the media statements by president Juan Carlos Varela and the U.S. ambassador here, John Feeley, that the fate of the dailies depend solely on the decision of his main stockholder to sell and prevent the closing of these papers. For its part, the Journalists Trade union protested again for what it considered ‘a violation of the right of freedom of expression’ and addressed the foreign and national governments, because the latter says it is ‘a matter on which they have no bearing’, said in a communiqué.

The guild summoned international journalist solidarity and recalled that in a few weeks, on January 6, 250 Panamanian families will be left in uncertainty, as GESA workers will be without a job if the dailies are closed down.

For political analyst Julio Yao, Panamanians feel frustrated and betrayed because, among other reasons ‘the empire has cut or put to the guillotine the freedom of expression, the freedom to inform and be informed’ after the ‘ilegal and unjust sentence’ to commercial, judicial and moral death of both newspapers.

After continuous critics, Varela told yesterday to reporters that the Ministry of Finance will ask the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) another license so the media continue their operations, but alerted again that the definitive solution is in the hands of the owner of GESA.

For its part, the U.S. embassy in this capital said: ‘The Government of the United States has explained in several occasions the circumstances behind the administrative designation of the Organization of Money Laundering Waked on the part of OFAC and the fact there is a legal way that allows the removal of a company from the Clinton List’.