Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
05PANAMA277
2005-02-07 21:50:00
UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY
Embassy Panama
Cable title:  

PANAMA: FISCAL REFORMS PASS WITH A GRIMACE

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UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 PANAMA 000277 

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE

DEPARTMENT FOR WHA/CEN
SOUTHCOM ALSO FOR POLAD

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV PREL ETRD PM LABOR HUMAN RIGHTSPOLMIL
SUBJECT: PANAMA: FISCAL REFORMS PASS WITH A GRIMACE

REF: A. PANAMA 00235


B. PANAMA 00089

SUMMARY
-------
UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 PANAMA 000277

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE

DEPARTMENT FOR WHA/CEN
SOUTHCOM ALSO FOR POLAD

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV PREL ETRD PM LABOR HUMAN RIGHTSPOLMIL
SUBJECT: PANAMA: FISCAL REFORMS PASS WITH A GRIMACE

REF: A. PANAMA 00235


B. PANAMA 00089

SUMMARY
--------------

1. (SBU) In a show of political courage and discipline, and
despite yelps of pain from business and white collar groups,
President Torrijos and his Democratic Revolutionary Party
(PRD) swiftly passed a fiscal reform package on January 31
that was signed into law February 2 (see Reftels). After two
weeks of seemingly constant civil society consultations,
sporadic but peaceful protests, and three required
legislative debates, the sometimes reluctant PRD legislative
delegation shepherded the package through the National
Assembly substantially intact. According to a senior GoP
official, the new law's revenue increases and public payroll
cuts should generate an additional $350 million through 2006,
80% of which will go to infrastructure (roads, housing,
drinking water),education, and health care. Opposition
politicians predictably blasted the bitter medicine of a tax
increase but nearly everyone acknowledged the need for one.
Public opinion seems cautiously optimistic that the GoP will
not squander the increased revenue and will keep its promise
to cut payroll spending. The GoP's performance on fiscal
reform signals its determination not to flinch when it cracks
the much tougher nut of social security reform. End Summary.

Key Aspects
--------------

2. (U) Despite some modifications, and with several
defections from opposition legislators, the Torrijos
administration succeeded in passing pretty much the fiscal
reform package it wanted. While the actual revenue and
savings effects of the fiscal reform package for 2005 are
still unclear, a senior GOP official told EmbOffs that
reforms should generate an additional $350 million by 2006,
80% of which will fund infrastructure (roads, housing,
drinking water),education, and health care.

Spending
--------------

3. (U) Key features of the public spending component of the
reform include:

- reducing the GOP payroll (except education, health,
security) by January 2008 to the level of December 31, 1999;

- taxation of previously tax-free "representational expenses"
as salary (Many public and white collar employees have
received up to half their salaries as tax-free

"representational expenses," basically a tax dodge that
exploited an existing loophole and fenced off varying amounts
of salary from the tax man and from social security levies);
and

- yearly spending increases cannot exceed the percentage
increase in the previous year's current revenues (starting in
2006).

Taxes
--------------

4. (U) On the tax side, key features include:

- an alternative minimum tax on corporations of 1.4% of gross
revenues (30% of an imputed profit rate of 4.6%, which can be
appealed by audit);

- increases in Colon Free Zone (CFZ) license fees, services,
and a per-container levy (expected to raise $30 million in
2005);

- an increase in registration fees for corporations;

- a selective consumption tax applied to casino and gambling
activities, with a 5% rate on slot machine winnings; and

- a phasing out of certain industrial incentives.

The additional revenue generated by the alternative minimum
income tax could reach as much as $135 million according to a
senior GOP official, who noted that the current method to
calculate income tax is too "deduction friendly."
Carping on Consultations
--------------

5. (SBU) Faced with the need for reform, opposition
Panamenista party critics and prominent business leaders
lamented the Torrijos government's lack of "consultation" to
build a broad consensus. In fact, the GoP and its PRD
legislative majority conducted an ambitious, two-week-long
schedule of consultations that ended with an almost endless
stream of ten-minute speakers before the legislature.


6. (SBU) Shortly before the law passed, Torrijos met with
members of the National Council for Private Enterprise
(CoNEP),an umbrella business organization, which opposed the
alternative minimum tax. Holding firm, Torrijos reportedly
said that he was "elected to make decisions." The GoP
further stated that it would adjust reforms quickly if they
proved ineffective. Some business and labor interests in
Panama City and the provinces continued to demonstrate
peacefully against the reforms and the Torrijos government's
limited consultations.

Money Down the Drain...
--------------

7. (SBU) Nearly all non-PRD politicians were highly
skeptical about how the GoP would spend its new revenues.
While most business leaders conceded the need for
infrastructure improvements, they questioned the GoP's
ability to curb corruption and spend new revenues wisely.

or Class Warfare?
--------------

8. (SBU) Former Democratic Change (CD) presidential
candidate and supermarket magnate Ricardo Martinelli
portrayed the reforms as a cynical attempt to divide rich and
poor, circulating an email about GoP plans to provide a $100
subsidy to poor Panamanians. (Panamenista politician Juan
Carlos Varela also took this line, even disingenuously
comparing Torrijos with Venezuela's Hugo Chavez.) To
Martinelli's consternation, all three CD legislators voted
for the reforms. (Note: CD legislator Dalia Bernal is the
sister of Torrijos's Education Minister. End Note.)

A Middle Class Tax...
--------------

9. (SBU) Panama's highly leveraged, smallish middle class
found itself in the crosshairs of the reform, which will tax
it more heavily by eliminating the tax-free status of
"representational" expenses. One CoNEP leader claimed that
the reforms were a "grave error" because they would reduce
the income of professionals by up to 10%. Former MOLIRENA
legislator, lawyer Jorge Alberto Rosas, said the legal
community predicts the reforms will prompt company mergers to
reduce costs, causing layoffs of middle-class technical and
professional employees.

or a Failed Canal Referendum?
--------------

10. (SBU) Opposition and PRD supporters agree that the GoP
took a great risk by tackling fiscal reform and many predict
it will pay a political price, possibly in a failed
referendum for Canal expansion (expected in late 2005).

Comment
--------------

11. (SBU) Reactions to the fiscal reform package have been
predictable, with opposition pols trying to score points,
weaken the Torrijos government, and deflect attention from
their own internal problems. Similarly, the business
community, with a few enlightened exceptions, attempted to
paint a specter of lower growth and higher consumer prices.


12. (SBU) Nonetheless, in pushing through fiscal reform
with an intact alternative minimum tax, Torrijos succeeded in
holding the party line in the first of the three great
challenges that his administration has set itself, which also
include social security reform and Canal modernization.
Although some critics say that Torrijos should have pushed
Canal expansion first, Torrijos perhaps wisely chose to
create momentum with the easiest of his ambitious projects
(not to mention that the Canal proposals are not yet in final
form). Also, by passing a new law that takes action against
"the rich," Torrijos puts himself in a better light with
Panamanians of more modest means as he gears up to put social
security on a more secure footing.

MCMULLEN