By Mica Rosenberg and Sean Mattson
PANAMA CITY (Reuters) - Panama could elect a multimillionaire supermarket magnate as president on Sunday, as conservative Ricardo Martinelli's knack for business draws poor voters worried about an economic crisis and high inflation.
Martinelli was leading polls by double digits ahead of the vote, bucking a left-wing trend in Latin America, as support waned for the left-of-centre government that is struggling to rein in street crime and rising food and fuel prices.
Balbina Herrera, of the ruling Revolutionary Democratic Party (PRD), has an anti-U.S. past and old ties to a former military strongman that rankle with some voters.
The flagging economy -- with growth set to slow sharply this year as the global crisis hits trade through the Panama canal -- has also turned some PRD supporters away.
"Our most serious problem is the cost of living, which is what leads to crime because people don't have enough money to eat," said shoe shiner Aladino Inestrosa, 67, in the run-down Panama City suburb of San Miguelito where Herrera was once mayor.
"A banana now costs 45 cents when before it was 10 cents. That's why I'm voting for Martinelli," said Inestrosa, sporting Martinelli's Democratic Change (CD) party logo on his cap.
One recent poll showed Martinelli backed by 53 percent of voters in the lowest income bracket and with a huge 45-point lead over Herrera in poor rural areas west of the capital.
Nationwide, an April 23 survey gave Martinelli a 14-point lead.
Both candidates plan to use infrastructure projects to inject some life into the economy and both will push ahead with an ambitious $5.25 billion expansion of the canal.
But neither is expected to run up a big budget deficit, which could worry foreign investors drawn for years to the country's booming service and property sectors.
LIKE A BUSINESS
Fuelled by U.S.-Asia trade through its transoceanic canal and robust banking activity, Panama's dollarised economy has led Latin America with growth of near or above 10 percent in recent years. But 2009 growth could slow to 3 percent or less as the global crisis hits credit and shipping.
Demand for luxury apartments in the skyscrapers that dominate Panama City's skyline is dropping. Builders say some new projects are on ice and half-built condos are up for sale.
Martinelli, 57, a U.S.-educated and self-made businessman who owns the dominant Super 99 supermarket chain, wants to build ports, highways and a Panama City subway if he wins. He would also impose a flat tax of between 10 and 20 percent to appeal to foreign investors keen for a clearer tax code.
"To run this country you have to know about international business, you have to know how to be a good administrator," bank employee Julio Flores, 25, said of Martinelli.
Both candidates want to finalise a free trade accord with the United States, which has been held up in the U.S. Congress by concerns about Panamanian labour rights and tax evasion.
Herrera, 54, clashed with Washington when she led protests against former President George H.W. Bush, who visited after a 1989 U.S. invasion to oust General Manuel Noriega, a dictator now in a U.S. jail for drug trafficking and money laundering.
Herrera has tried to play down old links to Noriega, who has said he hid in her home from U.S. soldiers during the invasion.
(Editing by Catherine Bremer and John O'Callaghan)
