Vice President backs insider sweetheart deal

Carlos Guillermo De Ycaza, a director of the state-controlled National Bank has garnered  $2.6 million direct-purchase accounts for his marketing company from the presidency.

De Ycaza’s company –Marketing Integral– was favored in  March with a $1.7 million direct contract granted by the Vice President and Minister of the Presidency, José Gabriel Gaby Carrizo.

Last August, he got another direct contract of more than $ 900,000 reports La Prensa. The paper tried to interview De Ycaza about what appears to be a conflict of interest but replied that he would not comment with any media on the subject

Last August De Ycaza Córdoba received unanimous support from the National Assembly when he was ratified to occupy a seat on the board of directors of the National Bank of Panama.

The publicist no sooner went from being a mere mortal to being a director of the National Bank, than he began to do business at the Ministry of the Presidency says  La Prensa.

His involvement in direct hiring dates back to August 2019, the month he was anointed for the bank position. But then he had to deal, with former Vice Minister of the Presidency, Juan Antonio Ducruet.

At that time, the Presidency was already managing a package of four contracts – with different companies – in the areas of advertising, branding, marketing, and communication, for a combined amount of $2.8 million.

Ducruet dumped one of the companies for reasons that were not explained.

But De Ycaza Córdoba’s company remained in the package, and the Ministry awarded him a contract that was valid from August to December 2019for  $908,000, to provide “strategic branding, marketing and communication services”, very similar to those obtained this year, for four months – and in the midst of the pandemic due to the new coronavirus – for an amount greater than  $1.7 million.

In other words, the company got two contracts without competition, totaling $ 2.6 million from the Ministry of the Presidency.

The second contract – signed by Vice President Gaby Carrizo came in March, two days after the coronavirus State of National Emergency was decreed.

To justify the hiring and without price competition, the ministry used the pandemic as an excuse, although, in reality, the health situation was only a marginal issue in the company’s marketing studies, according to documents revealed by the Ministry itself.

There are at least seven companies, almost all are family-based, in which not only the vice president’s family members but the official himself appear. 

, in the company Pes, SA, Carrizo appears alongside Raúl Cortizo –brother of the President of the Republic, Laurentino Cortizo– as the agent of the company. says La Prensa.