International media report Martinelli to alleged FCC bribery probe

The name of former Panama president Ricardo Martinelli has again surfaced in international media  carrying reports  of the scores of millions of dollars alleged paid in  bribes by the Spanish FCC in Panama and other Central American countries

The company was awarded the construction of the Vía Brasil road rearrangement project and participated together with Odebrecht as part of the consortium that built Lines 1 and 2 of the Panama Metro.

As reported by the Spanish El Confidencial , the works in Vía Brasil, join the group of works allegedly rigged by FCC in Panama, by paying commissions that would add up to $82.7 million

The bribes would have been executed through a complicated network of companies that would have ramifications in Uruguay, Andorra, and Switzerland, and the funds would have ended up in the office of local lawyer Mauricio Cort, alleged to gave been the frontman for Martinelli during his presidency 2009-2014..

The report of the international media also indicates that the investigations have advanced in other works that are suspected of irregular operations such as lines 1 and 2 of the Panama Metro and the Hospital City, which to date remains paralyzed reports TVN News.

The Spanish  newspaper  publication says  “the company has been forced to admit that it achieved those

orders by buying Martinelli, not only with the payment of commissions, but also gave him a 50% stake in the Altos del Javier society SA , a company constituted by the construction company in 2011.

FCC would have created Altos del Javier SA, to buy the farm where the old facilities of the Javier College were, whose buildable area is 30,000  square meters. The campus moved to Clayton in 2010. The following year, the Society of Jesus sold o FCC the land it had occupied for half a century inPerejil, for $17.1 million.

” Neither the neighbors of the area, who have complained repeatedly about the abandonment of the facilities after the Jesuits left, never knew that FCC had bought the land, and less, that Martinelli

had taken half of the land ” , says the report.

Meanwhile, to pay the bribes of lines 1 and 2 of the Panama Metro, FCC used shadow companies and contacts provided by Odebrecht.

In the case of the Hospital City, FCC designed its own system to get the money to former president Martinelli, through transactions in bank accounts in Switzerland and Andorra.

The authorities in Spain keep track of other FCC project transactions that were made in Panama and other countries in the region.