Mining deal leaves Panama stuck in third world

When examining the contract-law that the State signed with Petaquilla Minerals in 1997, we see at a glance how leonine its content, the privileges, and the anemic benefit for the country; it contains abusive clauses and a series of anomalies allowed outside the Mining Code that today are the origin of the great problems that the country faces with the copper company. On the one hand, this mining company has threatened Panama with arbitration processes to recover its operation, while the original concessionaire –Petaquilla Minerals– would have informed the Government that it will be the subject of another arbitration, for which it seeks foreign financing from unsuspecting people, convinced of “invest” no longer in the mine, but in the lawsuit. Meanwhile, the Government has not yet ruled out giving the gold extraction concession to a third company and nothing has been communicated to the country about this. Panama is a complete and shameful disaster in the management of the mining issue, simply because the country lacks technical resources and regulations, as well as a robust institutional framework that would give it more credibility. Every day it is more evident that we are stuck in the third world – LA PRENSA, Mar. 5.