Advice: $14.4 million in 11 months

ADVICE doesn’t come cheap in Panama. The Directorate General of Revenue (DGI) has ordered the seizure of the assets of Agro-Energy, International SA, which between 2012 and 2013 received $14.4 million for advice from Hidalgo & Hidalgo, the contractor for the failed Tonosí, irrigation system currently under investigation by the Third Anti-Corruption Prosecutor.

According to a press releas , International Agro-energy has failed to pay up to $1 million in taxes to which would be added a potential fine “of up to eight times the nominal sum so far. ” So seizure is up to $ 9.1 million, which is the total amount of the penalty provided for in the Tax Code.
The defrauded amount could increase, as research progresses reports La Prensa
The information handled by the DGI shows that Agro-energy, whose legal representative is Moyedo Juan Alberto Moreno, billed $ 14.4 million to Hidalgo & Hidalgo, in respect of “consultancy”, between August 2012 and July 2013. The company had a behavior “of recklessness and calculation against the state says the DGI.
As part of the record of the Third Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, they have already investigated the ex- vice-president and trader, Felipe “Pipo” Virzi; former Minister of Agricultural Development, Oscar Osorio and President and CEO of Hidalgo & Hidalgo, Juan Antonio Hurtado and Marco Alban Crespo, respectively. All are under preventive detention.
Forty Virzi accounts were frozen by order of anti-corruption prosecutor Zuleyka Moore, who proved that the employer received $10 million from Hidalgo & Hidalgo, shortly after the company benefited from the award of the Tonosí contract.
Virzi’s defense has said that payment corresponding to the fees they received from their client as project “advisers. ” On Tuesday, June 16 the Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF) reported that Virzi returned $5 million to the Treasury.