Transfer of the Panama Canal

Transfer of the Panama Canal

Skepticism and controversy have surrounded the Panama Canal's recent turnover by the United States to Panama. The Panama Canal, completed in 1914, spans 51 miles across Panama from the Atlantic to the Pacific Oceans. Considered to be the biggest civil engineering project in history, the canal shortened the trip from San Francisco to New York by 8,000 miles. It is navigated by fourteen thousand ships a year, four percent of the world's maritime commerce.

Although the United States picked up the $352 million price tag and it's very existence is credited to former President Teddy Roosevelt, Panama still considered the canal rightfully theirs. Roosevelt engineered its independence from Colombia in 1903 so he could build the canal. In 1977, then President Jimmy Carter and Panamanian leader at the time General Omar Torrijos formed a treaty that would revert the ownership of the canal and the 10-mile Canal Zone surrounding it back to Panama on December 31, 1999.

The 22 years long process of turning over responsibility for the operation, administration, and defense of the canal officially ended with the withdraw of the last 10,000 U.S. troops from the canal zone. The handover of the Corozal military installation to Panama was also a symbol of Panama's growing sovereignty, although a small number of soldiers will remain as part of the U.S. Embassy's military assistance team.

The new President, Mireya Moscoso, goal is to change "a world-class location into a world-class country, technologically literate and future oriented." Moscoso comes into office at a time when Panama is trying to rediscover itself. Although it's economy is not totally dependent on the canal, it's self-image depends on whether the newly-appointed members of the Panama Canal Authority can make the canal a valuable money-making resource instead of being run on a non-profit basis as in the past. One of her most difficult tasks will be to protect the canal's neutrality by guarding it from political corruption and mismanagement. The economy is also at risk with unemployment rates at 13% and the closing of U.S. military bases, which may raise that even higher.

The security of the Panamanian-controlled canal is a major concern for both Moscoso and the United Sates, who has the right to defend the canal with military force under the Treaty On the Permanent Neutrality of the canal, but only if canal operations are jeopardized.