Panama A Colonel Takes On the General

Prosperous and calm, Panama has long been an anchor of stability in turbulent Central America. But despite the placid facade, resentment has been building against a corrupt and authoritarian government. Last week that anger burst to the surface in some of the worst violence to hit Panama in a decade. The unrest was prompted by a serious allegation, that General Manuel Antonio Noriega, 48, commander of the Panama Defense Forces and the country's most powerful figure, helped arrange the 1981 air-crash death of his predecessor, General Omar Torrijos Herrera.

The charge came from Colonel Roberto Diaz Herrera, 49, a cousin of Torrijos who retired two weeks ago as second in command of the Defense Forces. According to Diaz, Noriega conspired with the Central Intelligence Agency and a high-ranking U.S. Army officer to plant a bomb aboard Torrijos' aircraft. Diaz identified the officer as General Wallace Nutting, retired commander of the Panama-based Southern Command, which directs U.S. military operations throughout Central and South America. Both the CIA and Nutting denied the charges.

Though most analysts dismissed the possibility of U.S. involvement, the charges were enough to send thousands of angry youths into the streets to demand the ouster of Noriega and a return to democracy. The demonstrators ; constructed barricades of burning rubbish and tires, and fought pitched battles with squads of riot police nicknamed "Dobermans." At noon and 6 p.m. each day middle-class protesters hung out of their windows, waving white handkerchiefs and making an antigovernment racket by beating on pots and pans.

After three days of violence and dozens of injuries and arrests, the government declared a state of emergency, which suspended some civil rights, and sent thousands of soldiers into the streets. The show of force, together with an opposition-orchestrated general strike, restored at least the appearance of calm, but by week's end troops again skirmished with marchers.

Colonel Diaz, meanwhile, had barricaded himself with a group of armed supporters in his garish million-dollar Panama City mansion -- a domicile the newly religious and repentant military man now admits was paid for with bribes. "This is an illegitimate government that has created an institutionalized crisis," he told TIME. "I knew that the only way to change the system is to get rid of Noriega." He hopes he can foment a rebellion that will bring down the general. In addition to his accusations concerning Torrijos, Diaz charged that Noriega helped rig the 1984 presidential elections and that the Defense Forces masterminded the 1985 torture-murder of a Noriega opponent, Dr. Hugo Spadafora.

The government responded to Diaz's charges by issuing a statement that he was "suffering from a serious state of paranoia." While Noriega made no move to arrest his former colleague, President Eric Arturo Delvalle blamed the colonel and unidentified "external forces" for the rioting. Officials in Panama City have recently charged that U.S. opponents of the 1979 Panama Canal treaties are trying to undermine the government.