From May 1 to 6, Panama City hosted the first in-person meeting of the regional team for Democracy, Citizenship, Human Rights and Peace Building, which makes up Cáritas Latin America and the Caribbean. This meeting took place in the context of the electoral process that took place in the country on May 5.

The meeting marked a significant milestone for Cáritas Latin America and the Caribbean, since it served as an electoral observer in the aforementioned election process of the new president of Panama, José Raúl Mulino, after winning the presidential elections with almost 35% of the votes. The participating observers came from Paraguay, Venezuela, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Mexico, Honduras and the host country.

Integration, planning and learning

The team coordination emphasizes that for this meeting it hoped to achieve, first of all, the confirmation and validation of the planning for the next four years and the goals that they want to achieve in this period.

Secondly, he wanted to carry out an exchange of experiences based on the significant experiences that each of the National Cáritas has, in order also to prioritize some of the issues that this work team wants to address and how to move forward towards significant actions, such as the electoral observation day with the Justice and Peace Commission and with Cáritas Panama.

Thirdly, the team believes that it was possible to appropriate and learn about the experience that was transferred from the Justice and Peace Commission and from Cáritas Panama as a learning exercise to put into practice a methodology for strengthening the respective national Cáritas. Cáritas Panama and the country's Justice and Peace Commission are one of the most advanced Church entities in this issue of electoral observation.

For Iván Camilo, during the meeting it was possible to share various experiences of the National Cáritas in Latin America aimed at strengthening democracy and citizenship. “In this sense, we should not necessarily limit our experiences in the dimension of democracy to electoral observation, but also diversify them in the accompaniment, training and empowerment of citizens for a conscious, participatory and well-informed democratic exercise.”

Encourage the social commitment of the Church

About the electoral observation day itself, the director of Cáritas Panama and director of the Justice and Peace Commission in Panama, Maribel Jaén, says that one of The great lessons for the Church of Panama and Caritas of Panama are that, first of all, the issue of democracy in Latin America and in Panama, in particular, should concern everyone.

The formal democracies that have developed in our countries have not resolved the great needs of the populations and people are demanding a new governance with greater social equity and social justice, he stressed.

The director also affirms that it is very important to be clear that the field of politics is also a privileged place to evangelize. “There is much to do from our parishes, our chapels and from our Churches and episcopal conferences in the construction of a political, economic and social model with justice and that allows for integral human development.”

Allied to these two points, Maribel evaluates that it is essential to encourage the social commitment of the laity to move from a Church that is only in the temples to a Church that is coherent, that makes coherence between faith and life and that has as its guide the Gospel, the work in the style of Jesus, starting from the people, of their reality, doing it as a team, in networks, making a community, making a preferential option for the poor, guided by the love of God and our brothers.

The regional Democracy team highlights that the experience in Panama will help in the electoral processes that will be developed in Latin America, but the electoral observation methodology will depend greatly on the electoral context of each of the countries. The understanding is that the methodology can collaborate or facilitate the recognition of the Church as an impartial and trustworthy actor in an electoral scenario, but it will not necessarily be received in the same way in all countries.

However, talking about electoral observation should also lead us, as a team and as Cáritas, towards what the different accompaniment methodologies could be so that the Church and the National Cáritas can also promote democratic exercise and citizen participation, being co-responsible for the transformation of society.