page_title: Martín Torrijos
section_title: Presidency (2004-2009)
hierarchical_section_title: Martín Torrijos / Presidency (2004-2009)
caption_attribution_description: US President George W. Bush welcomes Panama’s President Martin Torrijos to the Oval Office, Friday, Feb. 16, 2007. (Details)
context_page_description: Martín Erasto Torrijos Espino is a Panamanian politician who was President of Panama from 2004 to 2009.
  He was fathered out of wedlock by Panamanian military ruler Omar Torrijos. Martín Torrijos was educated in economics and political science in the United States. He then returned to Panama, becoming active in the Democratic Revolutionary Party. He was the party's presidential candidate in the 1999 general election, losing to Arnulfista Party candidate Mireya Moscoso.
  In the 2004 presidential election, he ran again as the PRD candidate. This time, his primary rival was Solidarity Party candidate Guillermo Endara, whom Torrijos defeated
  47% to 31%. Torrijos reformed social security and pensions during his term in office, as well as proposing and passing a $5 billion expansion of the Panama Canal. Torrijos was succeeded by supermarket magnate Ricardo Martinelli in 2009. He is a member of the Inter-American Dialogue.
context_section_description: In May 2005, the Torrijos government proposed increasing pension contributions and raising the retirement age to help pay off the nation's increasing foreign debt. The changes triggered several weeks of protests, strikes, and a student-led closure of the University of Panama, and the proposal to increase the retirement age was postponed. Following opposition from the Roman Catholic Church and union leaders, Torrijos also initially postponed plans to reform social security, though he successfully passed a reform measure later in his term.
  Torrijos's temporary unpopularity forced him also postpone plans for widening the Panama Canal until 2006. In April of that year, he presented a plan, calling it "probably the most important decision of this generation". The expansion was projected to double the canal's shipping capacity and allow it to handle oil tankers and cruise ships, at a projected cost of $5 billion. The plan was approved by public referendum on October 22 of that year with 78% of the vote.
  In November 2006, Torrijos sponsored the Latin American and Caribbean Congress in Solidarity with Puerto Rico's Independence in favor of Puerto Rico's independence and made an energetic call to the United States to recognise the independence of Puerto Rico. His administration opposed Colombian president Alvaro Uribe's proposals to build a road through the undeveloped Darién Gap connecting the countries, stating that it could damage ecotourism in the region.
  In 2007, Torrijos negotiated the Panama–United States Trade Promotion Agreement with the administration of George W. Bush. Though ratified in Panama and apparently headed to ratification in the US, the agreement was derailed in September 2007 when fellow PRD member Pedro Miguel González Pinzón was elected President of the National Assembly. González Pinzón had been indicted by a US grand jury for the 1992 murder of US Army Sgt. Zak Hernández, and some members of the US Congress vowed to oppose the pact until González Pinzón no longer held the post. Unwilling to publicly battle his party's nationalist wing, Torrijos privately asked González Pinzón to resign, but avoided criticizing him in the press. The deal was finally ratified under Torrijos's successor, Ricardo Martinelli.
  Torrijos was again popular by the end of his term, but because Panama's constitution forbids consecutive second terms for the presidency, the PRD nominated Balbina Herrera as a candidate to succeed him in 2009. She lost to an independent candidate, Ricardo Martinelli, the owner of a supermarket chain.
caption: Martín Torrijos and George W. Bush in the Oval Office, February 16, 2007
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon EOS-1Ds Mark II", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "125", "Image YResolution": "125", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS2 Macintosh", "Image DateTime": "2007:02:16 14:30:00", "Image Artist": "Eric Draper", "Image WhitePoint": "[313/1000, 329/1000]", "Image PrimaryChromaticities": "[16/25, 33/100, 21/100, 71/100, 3/20, 3/50]", "Image YCbCrCoefficients": "[299/1000, 587/1000, 57/500]", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "376", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1222", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "6279", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/250", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Manual", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "500", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2007:02:16 10:51:43", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2007:02:16 10:51:43", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "8", "EXIF ApertureValue": "3", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "57", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "875", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "583", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R03", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "1096", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "250400/71", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "666800/189", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Manual Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF Gamma": "11/5"}