José Raúl Mulino, the president of Panama, has accused Donald Trump, his US counterpart, of “lying” when he said that Washington would retake the Panama Canal.
“President Trump is lying once more. Mulino posted on X, “The Panama Canal is not recovering.”
After Trump claimed that his administration had begun reclaiming the crucial canal, Mulino tweeted on Wednesday, “I reject, on behalf of Panama and all Panamanians, this new affront to the truth and to our dignity as a nation.”
In his address to Congress on Tuesday, Trump stated, “My administration will be reclaiming the Panama canal, and we’ve already started doing it, to further enhance our national security.” “We’re retracting it.”
Trump’s remarks were made just hours after the Hong Kong company Hutchison announced that it had agreed to sell its profitable Panama canal ports to a consortium led by the United States, following increasing pressure from Washington.
In addition to selling a number of other non-Chinese ports, CK Hutchison Holdings announced that it will sell a 90% share in the Panama Ports Company (PPC) to a group headed by asset management BlackRock.
The business stated that the sellers will get $19 billion in cash.
Few people in Panama think that Trump’s promise to “take back” the canal has anything to do with the transaction, despite CK Hutchison’s insistence to the contrary.
For many years, PPC, a Hutchison company, has operated ports at Balboa and Cristóbal on the interoceanic waterway’s Pacific and Atlantic ends.
However, since assuming office in January, Trump has voiced his displeasure that China now controls the canal, a crucial strategic resource that the US used to possess.
He has refused to rule out a military invasion of Panama to reclaim power, provoking angry protests and a complaint to the United Nations by the Central American republic.
The Panama Canal Authority (ACP), an independent organisation whose board of directors is chosen by the country’s president and legislature, has been in charge of managing the canal since 1999.
Forty percent of US container traffic and five percent of worldwide maritime trade pass via the 80-kilometer (50-mile) canal.
China has repeatedly denied meddling in the canal.
“All Panamanians operate the canal. In January, Ilya Espino de Marotta, the deputy administrator at the Panama Canal, told the Guardian, “We are an autonomous entity.” “The canal is not managed by Chinese people.”