Martinelli health city boondoggle partly open in 2021

The first hospital areas in the City of Health will be operational, in 2021 nine years after is launch was trumpeted by then-President Martinelli while his satraps in social security planned to name after him. Instead, it became a massive boondoggle via a company linked to bribery and corruption.

The project now records a global advance of 65%, but there are areas where progress is minimal. This project has an initial cost of $554.3 million dollars, but it is projected to end up costing an additional 40%.

During a  project tour on Saturday, January 18, the current director of the Social Security Fund (CSS), Enrique Lau Cortés, said:”We are not going to wait until the whole project is finished to put it into operation, we will go by phase to release pressure from the metropolitan complex that is saturated” He indicated that the first areas that will go into operation are cardiology, nephrology, and cardiovascular surgery.

Lau Cortés reiterated that they hope for February 15 to have the result of the negotiation they have with the Spanish company FFC, responsible for the project tendered in 2012.

“I cannot give details of the negotiation, but the atmosphere is positive,” he said.

FCC has received payments for $323.5 million and currently, the Spanish justice maintains an investigation into the company on suspicion that it would have paid bribes in Panama to be awarded the project that has 17 buildings on a  29 hectares site.