Proposed restructuring in Panama’s Legislative Assembly will combine 21 autonomous commissions, including the Commission on Indigenous Matters, into one government-directed commission. Representatives of the Commission on Indigenous Matters, led by indigenous Kuna legislator Enrique Garrido, addressed the assembly on March 22 claiming that the independent commission is necessary to address and solve problems in indigenous communities. Garrido says that without the commission, indigenous communities will be further discriminated against, abandoned, and left without laws to benefit their unique position.
