Page 40 - Anatomy-of-a-Fraud

Article 224 of the Electoral Code forbids the dismissal of public or private
employees running for office. This so-called “electoral privilege” did not prevent these
officials from being terminated.
How many more civil servants were terminated? How many of them lacked
the courage to come forward and denounce these violations of the law and, worse yet,
of the most elementary rules of democratic coexistence? The exact figure may never
8
be known. The fact remains, however, that an undetermined number of citizens were
deprived of their livelihood for exercising their democratic rights. Not for nothing did
the Torrijista regimen, back at its inception in 1968, abrogate the Law on the Civil
Service and flatly refused to reinstate it during its 16 years in power.
And Barletta would have the gall to say that he won fair and square!

It goes without saying that the true purpose of these dismissals was to
intimidate the civil servants. They represented the real and tangible part of the message
they received at “El Cosita Buena”, complemented by the demagoguery then rife in the
government media. (See exhibit 6).

While others were being fired, some public officials known to sympathize
with the opposition were transferred to remote areas of the country, obviously as a
punishment to them and a lesson to their fellow workers. Thus, David Ricardo
Carmona, a top official in the Plant Sanitation Department at the Agricultural
Development Ministry’s regional office in David, was transferred, arbitrarily, to the
Province of Bocas del Toro. His job was taken over by a veterinarian. A worse fate
befell Magna de Valdés, a telegraph operator at Atalaya for eight years. Without prior
notice, she was ordered to transfer to Santiago for not having attended a welcome rally
for Barletta. Her boss thought that Magna would not accept the transfer and would quit.
Magna de Valdés did accept her new assignment but was fired upon her arrival in
Santiago.

Finally, and so that no doubt would remain in the minds of civil servants as to
the alleged equation job/salary = Barletta, the check for the second half of April, i.e.,
six days prior to the elections, included an odd stub. (See exhibit 7).

This most unusual document bore Torrijos likeness and the PRD colors and
flags. It read:

8
In its column “En Pocas Palabras” of May 29, La Prensa stated that 250 employees of the
Agricultural Development Ministry were fired in Veraguas for attending an Arias rally.