Page 117 - Anatomy-of-a-Fraud

“Ask (any Panamanian) about what happened on Sunday, May 6, when
presidential elections were held in Panama, and most of them will tell you that a huge
fraud took place on that day.
Politicians, lawyers, physicians, bishops, priests, Panamanian from all
walks of life, do not seem to grow tired of saying that something out of the ordinary
took place in their country”.
La Nación Internacional, San José, Costa Rica, June 14-20, 1984,
page 13

“According to elections observers, there is prima facie evidence for
investigating a number of irregularities, including the theft of and tampering with
tally sheets”.
Financial Times, London, May 18, 1984, page 5.

“During the last few years, Panama has been in a mad race, trying to get
to the highest possible point in a vicious circle of corruption that has made the
Panamanian people distrust its leaders, whether civilian or military. The climax
occurred with elections overcast by every possible suspicion of fraud, which
contributed to create an atmosphere of tension and unrest among the people that
sooner or later may erupt with dramatic results.
Following the chaos in counting the votes, which prepared the ground
for a fraud, opposition supporters will never cease to believe that Arnulfo Arias won
the election. The people went to the polls in absolute freedom and with initial
guarantees as to the integrity of the electoral process; they soon realized that ‘they are
not going to let Fufo [Arnulfo Arias] win’.
The PRD, which has observer status in the Socialist International, has
failed to project to its own people an image of honesty. Quite the opposite: its image
is that of a party controlled by the military and made up of gangs of hoodlums that
wreak terror on the streets, as happened on Monday the seventh, simply because on
that day the streets belonged to Arias’s supporters”.
El País, Madrid, May 21, 1984.

The 1984 electoral fraud received worldwide attention.
What more evidence can we produce?
What other testimony can we quote?
The fraud has been established.

Therefore, in the following pages we shall summarize everything that has
been said so far.