Guillermo Endara, Former president of Panama

Published on Wednesday 30 September 2009 22:35

Born: 12 May, 1936, in Panama City. Died: 28 September, 2009, in Panama City, aged 73.

GUILLERMO Endara suffered electoral fraud, a cracked skull and hunger on his path to succeed the strongman General Manuel Antonio Noriega as leader of Panama in 1989, then helped steer the country to democracy.

As the leader of a reform coalition, Endara appeared to have won a decisive victory in the Panamanian elections of May 1989 when Noriega nullified the results and unilaterally installed his own president.

Endara, a corporate lawyer known for his humility, responded by leading a street protest that ended in a bloody confrontation with the so-called Dignity Battalions, squads controlled by Noriega. Endara was hit on the head with a steel pipe, opening his scalp and causing a mild concussion. His two vice-presidential candidates were also beaten.

"I won't back off one inch," Endara said then at a news conference as he sat in a wheelchair, wearing a hospital gown.

He kept fighting back, first by urging Panamanians to protest by suspending payment of taxes and utility bills. He went on a hunger strike, which attracted popular attention partly because of his considerable girth. Endara was estimated to have dropped two of his 19 stones in the hunger strike, and while Noriega railed about "the hunger strike clown", the United States ambassador addressed Endara as president.

The denouement came in December 1989, when the US invaded Panama to remove Noriega, who had been indicted in US courts for drug-trafficking and had himself declared war on the US. At the request of the Americans, Endara was sworn in as president at a US military base shortly after troops began to move in. He had to rely on a US fax machine to announce his installation to the world.

Always sensitive to any hint of Yankee imperialism, Latin American governments, including Communist Cuba and Chile's right-wing military regime, sharply criticised the US's action and the new Panamanian government – even though some of these countries had severely castigated Noriega.

Endara said in a 1990 interview that it would have been easy for him to refuse the presidency under the circumstances. During his campaign, he had opposed American military action, but he decided to accept, claiming

"morally, patriotically, civically, I had no other choice".

Guillermo Endara Galimany, an only child, was born to an upper-middle-class family in Panama City. Various accounts say he was a brilliant student at secondary schools in Argentina and a military academy in Los Angeles, now defunct. He graduated first in his law class at the University of Panama, then studied law at New York University.

He returned home to open a law practice that grew into a respected corporate firm. He specialised in labour law.

Endara, like his parents, was a devoted supporter of former Panamanian president Arnulfo Arias Madrid, whose blend of charisma and populism has been likened to that of the Perns of Argentina.

Endara served two terms in the National Assembly as part of the Arias-led opposition. He was Mr Arias's planning and economic minister for 11 days before the government was toppled in a military coup in 1968. Endara went underground but was captured and jailed briefly in 1971. He fled into exile but returned to help Mr Arias rebuild his party after the ban on political activity was lifted.

It was because of his association with Mr Arias that Endara was chosen as a compromise candidate for president by the anti-Noriega coalition after Mr Arias died in 1988. Arias's widow had declined to run.

As a result of the American invasion, Noriega was extradited to Miami and convicted of drug-trafficking there. His sentence, reduced for good behaviour, ended just weeks ago, but he remains in custody as he fights extradition to France, where he faces money-laundering charges.

Endara staged another hunger strike in February 1990 to pressure the US into sending aid it had promised to Panama. Worried that the US would forget Panama once Noriega was removed, he stressed Panamanians' poverty.

As president, Endara promoted freedom of speech, established a civilian-led police force and laid out economic policies that helped Panama achieve an annual growth rate of 8 per cent under his presidency. He was unseated in the 1994 election by Ernesto Prez Balladares, and made two more unsuccessful bids for the presidency.

His first wife, Marcela, died in 1989. He is survived by their daughter and his second wife, Ana Mae Daz.