OPINION: Panamas corruption complicity

Hoyporhoy, La Prensa, June 1.

THE PRESIDENT and his advisers are still debating whether to approve the procurement bill. The clearest lessons of our opaque and manipulable, state procurement system are obvious: exaggerated cost overruns, unfinished works and, of course, a brigade of former officials and businessmen going up and down stairs in the investigative and judicial towers.

There is no doubt that the elephant in the glassware store is the company Odebrecht. To this, the Public Ministry has granted a shield that makes it untouchable to the injunctions of Brazil and Switzerland. It is an enigma how this Brazilian company gets construction projects, which have become the most important in the history of the Panamanian State.

To be or not to be complicit in corruption; that’s the only question that the Government must weigh. The presidential veto of bill 305 and full cooperation with international research is necessary, correct, moral, patriotic, and what we and all Panamanians want and deserve