The magic touch – HP or SOB?

A presidential slip of the tweeting finger had the airways buzzing in Panama on Tuesday . President Ricardo Martinelli  had replied to a message on his twitter line “respects HP.”

He was not apparently referring to the well known brand of spicy brown sauce loved by expat Brits. His remarks were directed at a tweeter who had complained about the high cost of living and called the president autocratic and more.

HP in Panama is the equivalent of SOB in English. Not even in the heat of debate in the British Parliament earlier on Tuesday,  when they were discussing the hacking scandal, the Murdoch media empire and the British Prime Minister’s lack of judgment, did the SOB acronym surface.

If it had, the offending user would  have been ejected,  and obliged to return later and apologize to the House, if the SOB wished to regain his seat.

The presidential equivalent was to wait two or three hours and, perhaps at the instigation of his spin doctors, send a picture of the famed wizard Harry Potter, saying that is what he meant respects, Harry Potter.. As the messages were in Spanish, HP seems an unlikely way of introducing the magical element into the discourse although political observers who know that HP brown sauce carries a photo of the Houses of Parliament on its bottles, might have realized that it was a way of introducing some more spice into the exchange.

PRD stalwart Pedro Miguel Gonzalez, a former president  of the National Assembly, at a hastily called press conferenceacknowledged that the person who raised the president’s ire, Osmar Nuñez, was his nephew. He said the family were surpised at the young architect's actions as he was an introvert who played in a band. Gonzalez  said however that there was no bigger Harry Potter in Panama than President Martinelli.

Nuñez issued an apology for his Twitter posting, but said he spoke out for the people.

Meanwhile, when the local storm in a sauce pot was brewing up, actress Emma Watson, brainy Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter series, said that she plans to return to the elite Ivy League university Brown, where the  HP word won’t be used, to complete her degree.

 Watson, 21, put her classes on hold earlier this year to devote herself full time to the record-breaking final film and other acting opportunities.

Maybe there’s hidden magical  talent  in local Twitter accounts.