Panama

WHEREAS on September 17, the Acting General Prosecutor of the Nation, Giuseppe Bonissi, asked the Supreme Court of Justice to declare unconstitutional the second paragraph of article 196 of the Penal Code, which decriminalizes the crimes of slander and libel for high government officials;and WHEREAS Bonissi was acting within the framework of an advisory of unconstitutionality presented for the purpose of widening the decriminalization to all government workers, and not just high officials and election personnel; and WHEREAS on September 28, 2010, the Second Superior Court of Justice of the First Judicial District sentenced the news director of TVN Channel 2, Sabrina Bacal, and journalist Justino González, who worked for the same station, to twelve months of prison, convertible into the equivalent in a fine at the rate of ten dollars a day, and a prohibition from exercising their profession for a period of one year starting on the date the fine is paid; and WHEREAS both individuals had been absolved at the first level in two trials that had studied the criminal case, following up on the supposed commission of the crimes of slander and libel in detriment to public servants who work in the Department of Migration and Naturalization of the Ministry of Government and Justice the trials had determined at the first level that the news report disseminated in September, 2005—which reported the existence of an investigation for the supposed commission of crimes of corruption related to a network of human traffickers—had been based on official information from a National Police report; therefore, it was a reliable report based on official information ;and WHEREAS none of the three magistrates of the Second Superior Court of Justice cited precedents from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, nor much less doctrine of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, concerning reliable reports; nor did they consider that since the reform of the Penal Code in 2007, which eliminated the old article 175 that penalized those who commit slander or libel, the doctrine of the reliable report has been tacitly incorporated into national law; and WHEREAS the reform of the Penal Code in 2007, which eliminated old article 175 that penalized those who commit slander or libel, the doctrine of the reliable report has been tacitly incorporated into national law and that the finding for conviction by the Second Superior Court of Justice also applied article 2079 of the Judicial Code, which had been incorporated into Panamanian law in December, 1986, that is to say, at the height of the military dictatorship under the command of then General Manuel Antonio Noriega; and WHEREAS this legal provision states that in support of the presumption of innocence, one who disseminates information on the identification of, or characteristics that would facilitate identification of, a person who is being investigated, and who permits association with the respective investigation, commits the crime of slander, which in all ways makes this law abominable and restrictive of freedom of expression and information; and WHEREAS on October 12 a group of lawyers and social communicators presented a proposal for a bill to Office of Citizen Participation of the National Assembly, seeking to completely decriminalize slander and libel for public servants, and at the same time limit the obligation to withhold the identities of those being investigated for the supposed commission of a crime, as contained in the aforementioned article 2079 of Judicial Code; it applies to employees of the Prosecutors’ Office, the Justice Department, and the National Police; failure to observe this obligation would be sanctioned administratively and not through the exotic characterization as slander WHEREAS Principle 5 of the Declaration of Chapultepec states “Prior censorship, restrictions on the circulation of the media or dissemination of their reports, forced publication of information, the imposition of obstacles to the free flow of news, and restrictions on the activities and movements of journalists directly contradict freedom of the press” ao livre fluxo informativo e as limitações ao livre exercício e movimentação dos jornalistas se opõem diretamente à liberdade de imprensa”. THE IAPA GENERAL ASSEMBLY RESOLVES to call on the president of the National Assembly of Deputies, José Muñoz, and the honorable deputies of the Republic of Panamá to consider the pre-project bill submitted by a group of lawyers and social communicators who wish to decriminalize slander and libel for all public servants and clarify the scope of article 2079 of the Judicial Code, so that in this way Panama may finally adopt standards concerning slander and libel that have been recommended since October, 2000 by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in its Basic Principle No. 10 on Freedom of Expression; to ask the President of the Republic of Panama, His Excellency Ricardo Martinelli Berocal, that once a bill that decriminalizes slander and libel for all servants of the state and clarifies the scope of article 2079 of the Judicial Code has been passed by the National Assembly, it be sanctioned by the Executive Office and promulgated in the Official Gazette; respectfully to call on administrators of justice, particularly judges and magistrates, that when analyzing cases of slander and libel that come to their attention, to keep in mind the doctrine and jurisprudence concerning freedom of expression American Commission on Human Rights and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.