Page 120 - Anatomy-of-a-Fraud

Barletta’s alleged victory, the result of fraud, violence, and death, is less a token of
triumph than a brand of shame, less a victory than a defeat, less an honor than a stigma,
a permanent stigma.

There are also the forceful and unequivocal pronouncements of the country’s
most representative institutions, such as the Panamanian Episcopal Conference, the par
excellence impartial and objective institution, the National Bar Association, the
National Medical Association, the Chamber of Commerce to mention but a few. And
there are, lastly, the reports by the international press which did what many national
journalists did not dare to do: call the fraud a fraud and the elections a farce.
Lastly, it has been learned that in the pre-dawn hours of May 7 there was a
meeting between the Defense Forces General Staff, the UNADE presidential ticket
(Barletta, Delvalle, and Esquivel) and some leading civilian figures of the regime. The
numbers produced by the Guard clearly showed the UNADE had lost the election.
“A heavy silence hung over the meeting. ‘Does that mean we lost?
Fraudito [Barletta] as last bleated meekly.

And all hell broke loose. Tony the Short [General Manuel Antonio
Noriega] turned blue with anger and a torrent of well-chosen epithets
fell upon Barletta’s progressively and irreversibly bald head.
‘What the…? (Fill in the blanks with the most sonorous profanity from

the rich barracks repertory)’. After deleting these expletives that would
have made a sailor blush, what Noriega said was:

‘What the &*#+ do you think, you, &*#+? Do you think for a minute

that we are going to turn over to Arnulfo this country that the gods gave
us so that we could plunder it to our heart’s content’?

52

Fraudito, as Paredes [General Rubén Darío Paredes, Ret.] had noted,
was chosen to be the candidate because of all the hopefuls, he was the

most obedient. Moreover, he was used to having the other general
[Torrijos] treat him as a trusted servant. His running mates sat in terror,
listening to the broadside. That is how the idea came up to take care of
the problem in 48 hours. But it was Noriegoras [General Noriega] who
always took the initiative”52.

… power does not rest upon rifles or tanks… power rests upon the acceptance
of law-abiding citizen.

52 Op. cit., May 28, 1984.
“In spite of the fact that the votes had yet to be counted, Barletta initially conceded defeat to
opposition candidate Arnulfo Arias, only to reverse himself after tactful suggestions that he do so
from members of the military”. Council on Hemispheric Affairs, Press Release, Washington, D.C., July
27, 1984, page 2.