
PANAMA: CRIMINALIZATION OF THE NGÄBE
by Tracy Barnett, Intercontinental Cry
Manolo Miranda, leader of an indigenous community recently flooded by Panama’s Barro Blanco dam, now faces up to two years in prison for causing delays and financial losses to the company that has ruined his community’s way of life.
Miranda began trial Aug. 18, together with two other leaders of the Ngäbe-BuglĂ© who opposed the dam, regional cacique Toribio GarcĂa and religious and protest leader Clementina PĂ©rez. All three face up to two years in prison for trespassing and interfering with the “inviolability of work” for their alleged role in an encampment that blocked the entrance to the hydro dam site in May and June of 2015. Charges against two other activists who were present at the encampment, Oscar Sogandares and Carmen Tedman, have been provisionally dismissed.
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