According to the Electoral Code and its regulations for the presidential elections within two years, there is no obstacle for candidates for the presidency of the republic R until July 31, 2022 and then to face the task of collecting signatures.
For former free-running presidential candidate in 2019, Ana Matilde Gómez, splitting the votes is a strategy, as the law also allows a citizen belonging to a political party to endorse an independent candidate with his signature, without that he loses his political affiliation, whether in an established organization or in formation.
Gómez described it as a kind of privilege or advantage that registered or politically engaged people have through a dual participation mechanism.
“If they don’t have the opportunity in their parties, they can use the number of the free application; On the other hand, those who are free to apply cannot be nominated by political parties,” he specified.
For his part, in statements made to the newspaper La Estrella de Panamá, the jurist
Ernesto Cedeño considered it shameful and nonsense that sympathizers of political groups intend to apply for free.
“They do so knowing that the electoral law only allows up to three applications for an open-ended position created as an option for nonpartisans and not as an escape route for politicians frustrated by groups to which candidates are applying.” , he stated.
He also specified that this could be a kind of strategy, considering that voting atomization benefits people who have a defined political structure and economic power.
Last June, other voices questioned the penalties the law places on independent candidates, such as activist Cristián Ábrego of the group Conciencia Ciudadana, who was running for an MP position.
For Ábrego, party members should be forbidden from wanting to appear on ballot papers as independents.
In this sense, he claimed: “If you run for the party, it is because you believe in the party and in its ideology. Mixing the two is a choice,” he said.
On May 5, 2024, the elections to be held by Panamanians will determine the country’s new president and vice-president, 20 deputies of the Central American Parliament, 71 deputies of the National Assembly, 81 mayors, 701 corregimiento deputies and 11 mayors, all with their respective deputies for the Period from July 1, 2024 to June 30, 2029.
mgt/ga