From Gang Stronghold to Community-Led Tours: The Panama City Story

Panama City's Casco Viejo district has become a familiar postcard: restored colonial facades, boutique hotels, and rooftop bars framed by the glass towers of the modern skyline. But the renewal that transformed the old quarter after its 1997 UNESCO World Heritage listing did not spill across the surrounding streets. Santa Ana and El Chorrillo, just north-west of Casco Viejo, still show exposed roof beams, bowed power lines, and the scars of a history that includes the 1989 US invasion and years of gang control.

Movimiento Cultural Identidad, a nonprofit founded by Santa Ana native Efraín Guerrero, is working to shift that dynamic. It runs two-hour English-language walking tours that begin at Plaza Santa Ana and weave through local markets, murals, and family-run kitchens. The idea is deliberately simple: put residents, not just buildings, at the centre of the visitor experience, and ensure that tourism money circulates within the community. Stops include Café Coca-Cola, opened in 1875 and said to be the only café licensed to use the Coca-Cola name, and Panadería La Venezolana, where trays of mamallena bread pudding sell out quickly.

The guide, Jonathan Sousa, frames the tours around a contrast: the American Trade Hotel now stands polished in Casco Viejo, yet not long ago the 1917 building served as a base for the Los Hijos Pródigos gang. The organisation argues that Santa Ana and El Chorrillo deserve to be known for culture and daily life rather than their difficult past.

Why Casco Viejo's Boom Skirted Santa Ana and El Chorrillo

Casco Viejo's World Heritage status changed the economics

UNESCO listing in 1997 brought investment and rising property values to Casco Viejo, but neighbouring Santa Ana and El Chorrillo were left out. The article's account points to a familiar pattern: recognition concentrates capital in the most visually salvageable district while adjacent areas with similar architecture but less legal protection see little of the benefit.

The community tourism model inverts the usual visitor flow

Movimiento Cultural Identidad's tours are built around 14 small businesses, from Café Coca-Cola to El Gato Negro and a nearby bakery. Because the tours are run by a community nonprofit and proceeds go back into the neighbourhood, the spending is designed to stay local. This is different from standard tourism, where hotel and restaurant revenue often leaks to outside owners or developers.

Gentrification is already visible on the horizon

Efraín Guerrero says he is not opposed to the money that tourism brings — he notes national tourism grew by 8% last year — but he wants the pace and shape of change to include residents. The risk is that the same forces that transformed Casco Viejo eventually displace the very bakers, guides and shopkeepers the tours showcase.

How Travellers Can Support the Real Panama

  • Walk with Movimiento Cultural Identidad rather than a generic old-town tour: the two-hour English tours start at Plaza Santa Ana and cost from £19, with visits to markets, murals and family-run kitchens.
  • Spend at the specific businesses on the route — Café Coca-Cola (opened 1875), El Gato Negro for lentil soup, and Panadería La Venezolana for mamallena — to keep money in Santa Ana and El Chorrillo.
  • If you are already in Casco Viejo, use the short walk into Santa Ana as a deliberate contrast; local guides can help explain the boundary between the polished old quarter and the rougher surrounding streets without treating residents as a spectacle.
  • Time a visit around lunch, when the tour includes sitting down at family-run spots; the organisation says all proceeds go back into the community.