Corruption robbed Panama of $300million – Comptroller

CORRUPTION, identified by government forensic audits during the last year cost the stae$300 million  says  Comptroller Federico Humbert  in his annual report.

He said the agency has carried out a total of 196 audits, of which 150 were of community boards and other institutions.

He said that the most high-profile audits were of purchases made through the National Assistance  Program (PAN).

He said that audits were also done of embassies and consulates in Washington, Valencia and Rio de Janeiro, and that the agency is in the midst of conducting audits of the embassy in India and of the consulates in the Canary Islands and Guadalajara.

Humbert said that “in many cases, funds were handled to hide the end-user of those funds.”To address this, he formed a forensic audit department.

“It was an arduous task, but the achievements were quite good,” he said.