THE GLOBAL AFRICAN COMMUNITY
T R A V E L N O T E S
THE AFRICAN PRESENCE IN PANAMA--FROM THE CANAL TO COLON CITY
DEDICATED TO BROTHER CLARAL RICHARDS
THE AFRICAN BACKGROUND
Between the Spring and Summer of 2003, I had the good fortune of visiting Central America on four occasions. During this period I went to Belize (twice), Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica (for the fifth time) and Panama. All of these countries have African communities, generally depressed and most often to be found along the Atlantic coastal periphery.
The indigenous name for Panama means `abundance of fish' and I went to this land of abundance, located at the southern end of Central America (or the northern end of South America), for the first time at the end of August 2003. The Republic of Panama was the forty-first country that I visited and I went there from Costa Rica. I had already visited Costa Rica numerous times and had made up my mind that the next time that I was invited there, that I would visit one of the neighboring countries as well--either Nicaragua or Panama. I only had a few days to spend in either place but I was determined to take advantage of the opportunity and to make the best of it.
I am not sure what my thinking was at the time, but Panama soon became the desired country of destination. In making this decision, I surely must have been influenced by the knowledge that African people have a long history in Panama--a history, by the way, that begins well before the massive enslavement and deportation of Africans to the Americas. According to Dr. Ivan Van Sertima, in his comprehensive and seminal work Early America Revisited:"Vasco Nunez de Balboa, 25 September 1513, coming down the slopes of Quarequa, which is near Darien (now called Panama) saw two tall black men who had been captured by the native Americans." And further, that Peter Martyr, "said that Negroes had been shipwrecked in that area and had taken refuge in the mountains. Martyr refers to them as `Ethiopian pirates.'
"Lopez de Gomara also describes the blacks Europeans sighted for the first time in Panama: `These people are identical with the Negroes we have seen in Guinea.' De Bourbourg also reports that there were two peoples indigenous to Panama--the Mandinga (black skin) and the Tule (red skin)."This knowledge was very important to me and I have long been arguing, with many others, that the history and presence of African people, even in the Western Hemisphere, should not and cannot be traced solely to enslavement and its aftermath, and that even our assessments of the enslavement period need to be revised. It should not be surprising to us that the great Joel Augustus Rogers has done an excellent job of this and provides a sense of historical continuity as well. Here, from his classic work Sex and Race, volume 2, we quote Rogers at length:
"Negroes, thirty of them, not only were with Balboa at his discovery of Panama and the Pacific Ocean in 1513, one of their number being a black nobleman, Nuflo de Olano, but there is the clearest possible evidence that they had been living in that region before Columbus, and were strong enough to make successful war on the Indians.
Later, the Spaniards brought in slaves in such great numbers, and they throve so well in the hot climate that Panama has remained chiefly a Negro country to this day, though modified somewhat by white immigration since the building of the Canal began in 1878.
Under the Spaniards, the white strain was quickly absorbed by the Negroes, who were often rebellious, and joined the pirates. There is the romantic story of King Bayano, an escaped slave, as told by Pedro de Aguado, a sixteenth century historian. Taking to the mountains with a number of other slaves, Bayano set up a kingdom of his own, from where he descended on the pack-trains of the Spaniards, capturing a great quantity of gold, silver, and precious stones. It was only with the greatest difficulty that the Spanish commander, Pedro de Orsua, succeeded in defeating him and his valiant band. Finally captured, Bayano was taken before the Spanish viceroy, who not only received him with honors for his bravery and resourcefulness but sent him a free man to Spain where he lived in luxury from the loot he had captured."
THE PANAMA CONNECTION
With this historical background, coupled with the knowledge that English is widely spoken in Panama, I more or less made up my mind that Panama was the place to go. And all of this was buttressed was by the role of my initial Panamanian contacts, which where absolutely instrumental to my success there, and they were the final piece in my decision to visit Panama.
The most important of these contacts were Sonia Ford, who facilitated my hotel arrangements and opened the first door for me in Panama, and brother Claral Richards, described as the "Nelson Mandela of Panama." Through these two Africans a whole other world of contacts opened up, most notably Ricardo Richards and Arturo Branch. Between these sisters and brothers I had a profound traveling and learning experience. I never really got lonely and I always felt connected. It makes a huge difference to your peace of mind to know that somebody or somebodies in a foreign land that you are traveling to is looking out for you.
FROM THE PANAMA CANAL TO COLON CITY AND BACK
On that first full day in Panama, brother Ricardo drove me around a great deal. Even before going to the Panama Canal, which Panamanians generally regard with great pride, we drove to the Afro-Antillean Museum, which chronicles the lives of the African builders of the Panama Canal. These were mostly Africans who came to Panama from the English speaking islands of the Caribbean early in the last century. Following the museum tour we drove across town to attend two meetings of local African activists, and then visited portions of the Pacific side of the Panama Canal.
The first real highlight of that first day in Panama was a journey to the town of Portebelo. This gave me a chance to really savor my excursion from Panama's Pacific side through rain forest and Maroon country and on to the magnificent life sized image of the Black Christ in the church in Portebelo. The Christ figure is actually deep biscuit brown in complexion with a crown of thorns and wearing a purple robe and carrying a cross. The image is in a large church regularly visited by devout pilgrims journeying from all over Panama.
Portebelo, and this was one of its attractions, is also in Maroon country--the Maroons being Africans like Bayano who refused to accept enslavement and established their own independent communities. And as if their ethnic identity needed any additional clarity let me point out that these sisters and brothers call themselves Congos!
From Portebelo we journeyed to the city of Colon, a largely African city, rather crowded with automobiles and densely populated, mostly Spanish speaking and located on Panama's Atlantic coast on the shores of the Caribbean Sea. The travel books on Panama that I read depicted Colon City in a deplorable light and essentially advised visitors to stay away from the place if at all possible. Here is what one travel guide says about it:
"Children run about in rags and the city's largely black population lives in rotten buildings. With the exception of one seaside residential neighborhood where some fine houses are tucked away behind high walls and security systems, the city is a slum. If you walk its streets, even in the middle of the day, expect to get mugged. It really is that bad. Walking in this city is very dangerous. A white tourist leaving a bank here will likely be mugged. If you have something to mail, send it from another city."
I really resented this kind of biased writing, and reading it and understanding that Colon City was a major African population center, I determined early on that it was a place that I would have to visit or my trip to Panama would not be complete. It also seemed special to me that I could begin my day on the Pacific and spend the late afternoon and early evening on the Atlantic.
I'm glad that I went to Colon City. I found it to be a vibrant and pulsing and fascinating place, full of Black people and rich in culture, and I walked its streets unafraid. It is true, however, that there is a rampant material poverty in Colon, with the most downtrodden and foreboding looking section of the city referred to locally as "the Vatican." I find words difficult to fully describe the place and I suppose that you would just have to see it for your self.
Back in Panama City, brother Ricardo and I capped off the day in an African owned restaurant feasting on some of the tastiest fish that I have ever had. That first day in the Republic of Panama is a day that I will always remember.
THE AFRICAN PRESENCE IN PANAMA TODAY
Arturo Branch, at the request of Claral Richards, took time out of his busy schedule to provide me with a personalized tour of Panama City. Like Ricardo Richards the day before, brother Arturo introduced me to a great many of the local residents and social activists, including numbers of aspiring politicians and business people. I say aspiring politicians as I was told by several people that although Panama is sixty per cent African that there were no Black elected officials. I found this shocking and very hard to believe but this is what I was told. But new elections were coming up and there were two or three Africans on the ballot. The major question was whether or not the local sisters and brothers would come out and vote. No one seemed to be very confident but the potential was heavy.
With brother Arturo I also passed through several of Panama City's African neighborhoods, many of them real slum areas mired in great poverty. One area was so bad that it was referred to as the "Pig House", and I was told that many residents literally lived in dread of venturing outside their doors for fear of being the victims of violent acts. The "Pig House" was Panama City's version of the "Vatican," the impoverished African community that Ricardo Richards drove me through in Colon City. These areas were about the most depressed communities that I have seen in the Western Hemisphere and I wondered what some of the African communities of Brazil and Columbia and Haiti must be like.
The neighborhoods that brother Arturo escorted me through contained both English speaking Africans and Spanish speaking African-Panamanians, as well as African-Colombians and African-Dominicans, each group tucked away in their own semi-separate enclaves. I found the whole thing utterly fascinating and looked at the entire day as akin to an anthropological field study. I then toured the section of Panama City most devastated during the 1989 US invasion. The figures varied widely but I was told that at least two or three thousand Panamanians died during the invasion and subsequent occupation.
THANKS TO THE PANAMANIAN CONNECTION
It was through this core cadre of Africans, Sonia Ford, Claral Richards, Ricardo Richards and Arturo Branch, that I learned so much about Panama and its African undergirdings. I was assured in all of my conversations that Panama was at least sixty percent African but that only about fifteen percent of them embraced their African identity. They said that a typical brother or sister might say something like, "Well, my grandmother was Black but I am just Brown." Or that, "although my Ancestors came from Africa I am now just a Panamanian." I must say that this level of argument and denial sounded so very, very familiar to me and I thoughit to myself how deeply African people are taught to hate themselves all over the world.
I was also able to get some inkling of the division between the Spanish and English speaking Africans in Panama. Of the two communities the English speaking Africans, many of whom are the descendants of the builders of the Panama Canal, seem to have it a little easier than the Spanish speakers. It should not surprise you to know that there is a pronounced degree of friction, much of it rooted in class distinctions, between the two groups. Will we never learn?
I found that Africans were much more visible on the streets of Panama City than in Costa Rica's capital of San Jose. In San Jose you only observe a scattering of African faces but in Panama City they seemed to be the majority, and it was rather exhilarating just to see the people and especially all of the beautiful African women! At the same time, however, there seemed to be very few Africans who worked in the banks, restaurants, museums (even the African museum!), airport and office buildings.
On another level, for those of you into sports, especially American baseball, you might find it interesting that Panama has produced such greats as Rod Carew, Roberto Kelly and the current New York Yankee sensation Mariano Rivera. I was told, by the way, that Rivera does a lot for the downtrodden Panamanian community that produced him. Good for him. And there is an effort to name the national stadium after hitting great Rod Carew but it seems that he is a little too Black for the deal to be sealed. Beyond the world of sports, I was informed that the noted African scholar, Dr. Kenneth Clark, is Panamanian.
MY LAST DAY IN PANAMA
I began my last full day in Panama with a visit to the pre-Columbian museum and, just as I suspected and just as I had noticed in the national museum of Costa Rica, there was little to be found in the way of Africoid images, statues and figurines. Nevertheless, I had to go there because you never know when you will discover an African treasure trove. And I am happy to say that my tour guide in the museum was a "sister." Now whether she actually saw herself as a "sister" is a very different matter.
That last night, thanks to Ricardo and Arturo, I did a global African presence slide presentation in Panama City. Panama was country number twenty-eight that I lectured in, and although organized on very short notice, the gathering, which was held at a local school, went very well and had a broad cross section of Africans ranging from university professors to business people to Rastafarians, elders and young people. The audience seemed very impressed by the overview that I gave, and I was able to gather even more information from the attendees who took it upon themselves to fill me in more completely about African life in Panama in a wide ranging discussion that covered everything from health care to the impact of Marcus Garvey.
I enjoyed Panama. I liked the people, learned a lot, had some fun, did some educating, built some bonds and felt a bit melancholy as I left the place. My great regret was that I had only been there for such a short time, and I trust that the next visit will be of considerably longer duration. Perhaps we can go together.
--San Antonio, Texas
April 2004
Copyright © 1998 Runoko Rashidi. All rights reserved.
Posted/Revised: Monday, July 19, 2004 7:15 PM
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