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Odebrecht: a reader’s and editor’s Q&A

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public enemy

Odebrecht: what do we know
and will we know more?

a conversation between a reader and editor

Donor lists — is there a link to those that have been published?

Varela is saying that he will post his stuff on the Panameñista Party website. But it includes all of these opaquely anonymous corporations whose principals are by and large not readily identifiable.

Jované says he will release his when he gets the data back from the Electoral Tribunal. But didn’t he give them that information in the first place?

Juan Carlos Navarro says that he will release his data only after everyone else does, which probably means that he won’t. Haven’t heard from FAD or CD, or the smaller parties like MOLIRENA or the Partido Popular. Or anything about who backed Martinelli’s ringer independents, or Gerardo Solís when he was running as an independent.

Also the norm is many of the same donors will donate to all candidates so it’s win-win for them later when they need favors.

Well, there are nasty things that one might truthfully say about Pedro Miguel González and the party that he leads, but he’s absolutely in tune with the nation’s interests about banning all corporate campaign contributions.

 

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MOVADUP, La unidad para la movilización

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MOVADUP
“Toda unidad debe basarse primero en la confianza…”

Ante la corrupción, crítica y unidad popular constituyente

por el Movimiento de Adecentamiento de la Universidad de Panamá (MOVADUP)

La corrupción es algo consustancial a las élites sociales y a la dirigencia política venal que de antiguo se les ha asociado. Pero ahora, lo que antes eran secretos que todo el mundo sabía, pero nadie confesaba, ahora son gritos de exhibición de desvergüenza. Antes observaban escrúpulos entre los ladrones de cuello blanco; ahora, las disputas entre ellos los hacen delatarse mutuamente mientras arrojan sus inmundicias al público.

En los años 60, la gente se levantó por la bandera mancillada en la Zona del Canal; ahora, un sobrecosto de 5 mil millones pende sobre la reciente ampliación de la Vía Interoceánica para beneficio de un consorcio dirigido por Sacyr, famoso por sus coimas internacionales. En los 80, el pueblo se indignó por el escándalo hipotecario del Seguro Social; ahora, la Junta Directiva de esa institución perdona las deudas a los que les roban las cuotas a los trabajadores; en los 90, impedimos la privatización del IDAAN; ahora, “100% agua potable” es una vacua ilusión y nos aguantamos los servicios más caros y deficientes. Hace algunos años, durante la administración de Martinelli, impedimos que nos metieran la “Ley Chorizo”, se apoderaran de las tierras indígenas y privatizaran la Zona Libre de Colón; ahora parecemos mudos ante los más graves escándalos de corrupción como los de Odebrecht y Mossack-Fonseca, en donde la oligarquía, con dos ejemplos de los abundantes casos que la caracterizan, exhibe con descaro la impunidad y la guerra verbal es más para entretener que para conducir a procesos de justicia confiables.

Así fue antes y así es ahora. Las victorias populares siempre han logrado avances, pero no han significado arrebatar las estructuras de poder a quienes las han monopolizado. Esas aguas ahora refluyen para dejar al descubierto la carroña que contamina la playa de la sociedad. Otrora, la nación cerró filas detrás de los pendones de estudiantes, gremios y sindicatos, movimientos cívicos y partidos opositores. Pero ahora, puesto que vastas dirigencias de estas organizaciones han participado o encubierto actos de corrupción y ahora se rasgan las vestiduras, ¿en qué o en quién puede confiar la población? La desconfianza popular es evidente en la baja asistencia a las protestas. La ciudadanía detecta, con razón, que las estructuras del Estado no son lo único podrido. Sospechan que hay, entre quienes los convocan, muchos elementos carentes de moral, con intereses mezquinos. En sentido contrario, ni siquiera el Consejo Académico actual de la Universidad de Panamá, institución llamada a ello por su liderazgo natural en nuestra sociedad, ha tenido valor para hacer lo correcto pronunciándose contra esta tragedia nacional de la corrupción.

En el MOVADUP, no obstante, somos optimistas, pues el mismo pueblo panameño que exhibe momentos estelares en sus luchas históricas sabrá poner en cuestión e incluso rebasar a los que pretenden hablar en su nombre, lo mismo que execrar a los que no se atreven a hacerlo, aun teniendo ese deber. Es ahí donde está el comienzo de la liberación. Toda unidad debe basarse primero en la confianza, y el MOVADUP estimulará un proceso pacífico en que sea el propio pueblo (no los actores políticos conocidos y cuestionados ni menos “comisiones investigadoras” de afuera) el que se dé los mecanismos para su propia regeneración. Como todo problema grave conlleva una solución radical, MOVADUP fomentará la unidad para la movilización en aras de la conformación de un proceso constituyente de la más amplia base originaria y popular que dé al traste con las prácticas viciosas y caducas y arrebate el poder a quienes siempre han abusado de él e inicie la regeneración nacional.

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Sáez, ¿Quienes pescan?

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nosotros

Los tres poderes del Estado en acciones comprometedoras

por Olimpo A. Sáez M.

La crisis que vive el país por los sobreprecios, que sabemos y no conocemos en cifras concretas, como tampoco las coimas repartidas a unos y otros por la constructora Odebrecht, se ha afiebrado con las declaraciones del abogado Ramón Fonseca Mora. Las mismas llegan a los tres poderes del Estado en acciones comprometedoras:

  1. El Presidente recibió dineros de Odebrecht.
  2. El Presidente impuso al Magistrado Ayu Prado como Presidente de la Corte Suprema de Justicia por ser manejable.
  3. Popi Varela y Beby Valderrama, diputados oficialistas, conocen de las intervenciones del Ejecutivo en el Judicial y en el Legislativo.

Estas declaraciones tormentosas, tienen a su favor las delaciones premiadas en Brasil, Suiza y USA, por las cuales conocemos de las coimas millonarias entregadas a panameños, de los cuales solo se conocen unos nombres, porque el Ministerio Público camina a pasos de selectividad y muchos creemos que de complicidad con muchos de los que deben estar presos y sus bienes cautelados, por el robo descarado de los dineros del pueblo.

A raíz del problema de Odebrecht que crece y se agiganta en Brasil, Colombia y Perú, con posibilidades de tumbar gobiernos, siguen provocando indignación en la ciudadanía de estos países. Panamá no es el único que está en el ojo de la tormenta, pero si es el que va más despacio en las averiguaciones con respecto a los responsables del robo millonario por las coimas entregadas.

Esta tormenta y sus fuertes remezones hacen crisis en el Gobierno Nacional y es lógico que los políticos, gremios, sociedad civil y ciudadanos en general empiecen a buscar soluciones políticas a la misma, si ella se sigue agravando y la ciudadanía sale de sus mecedoras y hamacas y se decide a reclamar sus derechos y a ejercer sus deberes. A raíz de esas voces legítimas que aparecen en la sociedad, se ha iniciado igualmente por algunos medios de comunicación y entre algunos ciudadanos, la especie, mal informada, confusa y quizás dirigida por el Gobierno de que esas propuestas, se prestan para que los “pescadores políticos pesquen en esas aguas turbias”. Se inicia pues, una campaña de desinformación, a mi parecer, de buena o mala fe, en señalar que los movimientos cívicos de protestas o las propuestas de algunos ciudadanos con respecto a la crisis que estamos viviendo son para “pescar en río revuelto”.

Creo que los políticos, sean del signo que sean, lo mismo que los ciudadanos tienen la responsabilidad de pensar y actuar frente a la crisis con valor, con coraje pensando en el país. Los oportunistas políticos del pelaje que sean, se les conocerá en el camino. El pueblo no es tonto, por no decir pendejo.

Entre las opciones o sugerencias que han aparecido para enfrentar la crisis están las siguientes:

  1. La renuncia del Presidente.
  2. El Juicio del Presidente por la Asamblea de Diputados.
  3. La Vicepresidenta debe asumir la Presidencia por los dos años y medio que faltan del período constitucional.
  4. Renuncia del Presidente y la formación de una Junta de Gobierno.
  5. El llamado a la Constituyente Originaria.
  6. El asalto al poder por parte del SUNTRACS, FRENADESO y el FAD.
  7. Esperar el 2019 para ir nuevamente a las urnas y sacarnos el clavo.

¿Cuál es el pecado de estas fórmulas? ¿Cuál es el Golpe de Estado? ¿Cuál es la revolución? ¿Cuál de ellas acabará con el país y con los negocios en Panamá? Eso lo debe decidir la ciudadania y los panameños en su conjunto.

Creo que estamos lejos todavía de encontrar en la ciudadanía en general alguna fórmula viable a la crisis. Creo que debemos trabajar en alguna fórmula posible, viable, cierta y unitaria para estar presente en la profundización de la crisis. Creo que solo la unidad en la diversidad podrá ayudar a resolver la crisis. Sin sectarismo político ni ideológico. Lejos está el Asalto al Cuartel Moncada, la toma del Palacio de Invierno, la Gran Marcha y que decir de la “revolución bolivariana de Hugo Chávez” para Panamá.

Por ahora, la ciudadania debe protestar una y otra vez, aquí y por allá, para exigirle al Gobierno transparencia y al Ministerio Publico que la justicia sea igual para todos, CAIGA QUIEN CAIGA.

A estas alturas del juego, ya nadie se engaña ni lo engañan y todos queremos:

  1. Justicia igual para todos. Caiga quien Caiga!
  2. Los ladrones coimeros y coimeados a la cárcel.
  3. Devolución de todos los dineros robados, que son millones de millones.
  4. UN ROTUNDO NO A LA IMPUNIDAD.

Los fantasmas del desastre, los augurios de la ruina nacional, los profetas del caos y el desorden, los voceros del miedo, deben ser rechazados por los ciudadanos pensantes. Los “pescadores en río revuelto” es una campaña para crear miedo y parálisis entre la ciudadanía. Otras crisis se han vivido y sufrido y Panamá la ha superado.

Llegó la hora de la ciudadania, de la vergüenza cívica, de la vergüenza nacional. Solo las calles nos salvarán.

 

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Taking an old dispute to the streets

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Kermit 1
Blocking Via España, much to the consternation of morning drivers.

The Panamanian way of arguing with the government

photos by Kermit Nourse

February 15 was a payday, with added numbers of people driving downtown to do banking or shopping. It was also the 25th anniversary of a dispute that began shortly before the 1989 US invasion. Workers for the old state-owned IRHE electric company and INTEL phone company were not paid their 13th month salaries back then — the Panamanian wage system gives workers an extra month’s pay per year, in two semi-annual installments — and after the invesion many were fired and others told that they would be eventually paid. They never were and in the late 1990s the utilities were privatized, leading to more job losses. The privatization laws had it that the new buyers would assume the obligations of the old government companies but by and large they never did. They didn’t pay the 13th month arrears, and sent both current but mostly former workers to the government to collect — which sent them to the companies to collect. Now it’s a quarter century after the last IRHE and INTEL arrears were accrued and the former employees want their money. Everyone points in a different direction or tells them to just accept their loss, but in the Panamanian political culture that’s an invitation to block the street unless and until some solution, or promise of a solution, is forthcoming.

As you may see, the inconvenienced drivers were not amused.

 

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The Panama News blog links, February 15, 2017

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Yes, it’s Dominican-American stuff, but very popular in Panama

The Panama News blog links

a Panama-centric selection of other people’s work
una selección Panamá-céntrica de las obras de otras personas

Canal, Maritime & Transportation / Canal, Marítima & Transporte

AP, Expanded Panama Canal still faces challenges

AP, Panama Canal Authority assures safety after report on wear

Splash 24/7, One in 50 ships has a fender bender in the new locks

Video, New PanCanal locks aren’t big enough

La Estrella, La actividad portuaria de Panamá cayó 9.1% en 2016

Fresh Plaza, Mexico renews old interoceanic corridor idea

Seatrade, Maersk and MSC add Asia – Europe and trans-Pacific services

Economy / Economía

EFE, Panamá pide a OMC sanciones por $210 millones a Colombia

ANP, Panamá será centro de distribución regional de Hewlett Packard

Caribbean News Now!, Regulator moves against Odebrecht’s bank in Antigua

Bloomberg, EU probe finds that UK is becoming a prime tax haven

Science & Technology / Ciencia & Tecnología

Scientific American, Record lows for sea ice at both poles

Washington Post, Ethicists advise caution with gene editing tool’s use on humans

ReliefWeb, Building a better Zika response strategy

Mongabay, LatAm palm oil planting doubled without much increase in deforestation

El País (Colombia), Cali también tiene su propia ‘escuela de hackers’

Spaceflight Now, India lofts 104 spacecraft with one rocket

News / Noticias

La Estrella, Fallece Ricardo Arias Calderón

NY Daily News, Family remembers Columbia grad slain in Panama

The Washington Post, Panama seeks arrest of Martinelli sons

TVN, Ana Matilde: “Decisión política puede tumbar a Juan Carlos Varela”

Telemetro, La defensa es que Riaño seguía instrucciones de Mossack Fonseca

La Estrella, Antai no investigará por las declaraciones de Fonseca Mora

The Washington Post, Brazil’s scandal spreads to the rest of Latin America

Dunya News, Pakistan Supreme Court resumes Panama Papers hearings

BBC, Mexicans march against Trump

Mongabay: Honduran politicians, US aid implicated in killings of environmentalists

AP: Con inmigrantes, empresa de cárceles de EEUU ve oportunidad

Daily Mail, Florida man shares photo of aide who carries nuke codes for Trump

NPR, US spies intercepted calls between Trump staff and Russians

Opinion / Opiniones

Ramsey & Bernal, Colombia’s ELN peace talks

Weisbrot, NAFTA has harmed Mexico a lot more than any wall could do

Sader, Why is neoliberalism surviving?

Maass, Dark essays by White House staffer are source code for Trumpism

Karon, Trump and the rebirth of press freedom

Greenwald, Leaks outing Flynn are serious and justified crimes

Gandásegui, Western terrorism

Blades, Otra tormenta perfecta

Sagel, Ignominia y vergüenza

Simpson, ¿Debe renunciar el presidente Varela?

Culture / Cultura

Vatican Radio, Pope writes preface to book by victim of clerical sex abuse

Chronicle of Higher Education, Otherness philosopher dies when needed most

NPR, DJ Betto Arcos shares his musical finds from the Panama Jazz Festival

 

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alt-Valentine’s Day

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Al Capone

alt-Valentine’s Day


 


 


 


 


 

THEM
 

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Editorials: Up to us; and Demagogues and dumb jocks

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haasta la victoria

On our own, as we should be

Show a Panamanian who wants Donald Trump to solve the Odebrecht scandal for Panama and you will have pointed out somebody who does not want to see justice done for Panamanians.

The United States has and uses a veto in the United Nations. The United States dominates the Organization of American States. Handing the problem to either of those organizations is to hand it to the United States.

The president of the United States is a vicious white racist with a long history of mafia ties. He ran for office on a platform of contempt for all Latin Americans. At present he is harboring in the United States Ricardo Martinelli and Alejandro Toledo, both former Latin American presidents who each took huge bribes from Odebrecht. President Trump has his presence in Florida, where Odebrecht paid off such politicians as Jeb Bush and Xavier Suarez and received huge public works contracts, but we have never heard one peep from Trump about that situation.

Yes, there are Americans inside and outside of Panama, dual citizens and those whose sole nationality is US, who would be able and willing to help. Yes, much of Latin America is similarly caught in this pervasive international scandal and many sincere and capable people in Panama and our sister republics in the region who would work together to address the many problems created by this monumental criminal enterprise.

When it’s useful and it doesn’t compromise our national interests, Panama should accept help from its friends, and likewise lend assistance to our friends in need. Unfortunately, the spirit of mutual assistance among neighbors in search of justice has been lacking in our government.

But this is our problem. Panamanians from all walks of life need to make the sacrifices, do the work and run the risks to cure the evils that have given us the Odebrecht scandal. The facile solution of letting the Americans take care of it is no solution at all. Panama is an independent nation and it’s time for Panamanians to act according to that principle.

Uuuuh — foo-BALL!

The military officer who carries “the football” — the satchel from which a world-ending nuclear war might be launched — for President Trump has been photographed and identified in the world press. Perhaps that will require his replacement.

It was a security gaffe, every bit as serious as Hillary Clinton’s celebrated private email server. It’s the sort of thing that’s forthcoming from an administration of demagogues and dumb jocks.

Bear in mind…

I used to dread getting older because I thought I would not be able to do all the things I wanted to do, but now that I am older I find that I don’t want to do them.

Nancy Astor

It is better to die on your feet than live on your knees.

Emiliano Zapata

The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not “Eureka!” (I found it!) but “That’s funny …”

Isaac Asimov

 

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MIREN, Get rid of corruption without foreign intervention

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Jované
MIREN secretary general Juan Jované talks to the non-corporate press. Archive photo by MIREN.

We have to eradicate corruption
without foreign intervention

by the Independent Movement for National Refoundation (MIREN)

Panama is a sovereign country, such that we, its citizens, are obliged to fight tenaciously to combat corruption that’s caused by a system that puts lucre and rapine before the welfare of the population. Our problems should be resolved by Panamanians. We can’t pretend that institutions that have offended our country, like the OAS, or with their rigged dialogues have deceived our population, like the UN Development Program has, can now appear as our means of salvation.

We need to unite our people to refound the nation — this is our only road to a decent country. An independent commission of Panamanians of probity who are committed to national sovereignty should be constituted, and they might use international assistance.

 

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FPB Bank and brokerage closed for Odebrecht, Mossack Fonseca ties

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cash laundry
Stealth banking: go to their website and try to find out who actually owns or until the recent government invention ran this bank. Photo from their website.

FPB Bank and brokerage: the Odebrecht
scandal hits Panama’s banking district

by Eric Jackson

At the end of the business day on Friday, February 10, the Banking Superintendency of Panama ordered the takeover of BNP Bank Inc. In tandem with that the Securities Markets Superintendency of Panama suspended the bank’s brokerage license. The reason later given to Telemetro News by the secretary general of the Banking Superintendency, Gustavo Villa, was that the bank was linked to the monumental Lava Jato scandal that began in Brazil but has now spread to many countries. Villa said that given the circumstances it would be too risky to allow a voluntary liquidation, that the most prudent thing was to appoint someone in whom the superintendency has confidence to take over while deliberations and possibly litigation ensues about what will happen to the bank.

The bank is relatively tiny in the scheme of things, with some $134 million reportedly on deposit and a stated capitalization of $13 million. The intervening authorities will have to verify and quantify before it would be possible to let people recover their money in bank or brokerage accounts.

Prudent investors and depositors would have already run away from the bank with their money. The institution could have been noted in the Panama Papers revelations of early 2016. The bank was mentioned early on in the raucous and still ongoing related scandal about Maltese public officials’ covert offshore financial dealings. Also early in 2016, the banking superintendency here issued an opinion — a warning, really — that said that it was acceptable for FPB Bank to rely on the Brazilian firm Serasa Experian to vet their Brazilian banking clients, but it was not OK for the bank to just insert notes in their files saying that said customers checked out with the Serasa Experian in lieu of inserting the actual reports from that company.

The big red warning flag came last July, when Brazilian police and prosecutors, looking for evidence in a bribery and bid rigging scandal involving the construction centered conglomerate Odebrecht and the Braskem chemical company that was a partnership between the Brazilian state-owned Petrobras oil company and Odebrecht, stumbled across records referring to both the Panama-based multinational law firm Mossack Fonseca and to FPB Bank. Brazilian authorities quickly concluded that both the law firm and the bank were running money laundering operations. Panama was promptly informed but the government and legal system here took no immediate action.

The president and legislature in Panama had, at the time, just passed a law with a provision that whatever criminal activities that foreign courts might find, none of their judgments would affect any company’s standing to bid for or hold contracts with the Panamanian government. It was an Odebrecht protection law and widely said to be that at the time.

What Brazilian law enforcement people say that they found and heard where contradictory stories calling into question the relationship between Mossack Fonseca and the FPB Bank — the law firm signing up clients for the bank, the bank signing up clients for Mossack Fonseca, and each saying that they recruited their own clients and if those folks decided to do business with the other company it was those clients’ independent choice. There were 44 anonymous companies organized by Mossack Fonseca with accounts at FPB, with the Brazilian police having encountered the situation in the first place because some of those companies had been used by Odebrecht or its affiliated companies or persons to move money that were believed to be for the purpose of bribery. It was easy enough for Brazilian law enforcement to see a crime, because the bank is not registered to do business in Brazil, but there it was, signing up clients and helping them set up shell companies to conceal their assets, all in violation of Brazilian law.

But would somebody doing his or her due diligence about FPB Bank Inc have had to pay attention to the news to see warning flags? On the surface, the bank is anonymously owned and run. The closest their website gets is the statement that:

The Bank is supported by the entrepreneurial group of its stockholder, with more than forty years of experience in the financial market, who is part of the second generation of a Brazilian family of bankers known for exalting and sharing such values as long-term commitment, responsibility, ethics and the search for excellence.

Ignore the glaring omissions on the bank’s website and go back to the news and you may dig up references to a Brickell Group as the family of companies of which FPB Bank is a part. In a 2013 announcement by the semi-official Panamanian ANP news service, you might see some names affiliated with the bank: they were opening a new office in Panama City and on hand were bank president Eduardo Pinheiro, bank general manager José Paulucci and, as a special dignitary for the occasion, one Maílson Ferreira da Nóbrega.

Nóbrega was the Brazilian finance minister of the late 1980s who oversaw runaway inflation, which he unsuccessfully tried to control with austerity policies. He’s a man of the political right and a mover and shaker in the Brazilian high finance scene that has been moved and shaken by scandal.

Look up Pinhiero and Paulucci and you find the two names associated, but at first glance neither in Panama nor Brazil. Their LinkedIn pages and various business websites place them in the US state of Florida, in the Miami and Fort Lauderdale area. They have Brickell Management Services Inc, a Miami consulting company that claims just six employees, in common. They also have FPB Bank, which was unsuccessfully sued in Florida courts by a Mr. Cardsoso, whom they signed up as a loan guarantor in Florida for a Brazilian tourism company that went belly-up. The court said that FPB is a Brazilian bank and that the contract had a dispute resolution agreement specifying Antigua as the venue for any litigation, so that while Florida might have jurisdiction, it was inconvenient — forum non conveniens in US legal Latin — to hear the case in Florida. Such payments made on that disputed loan were made “to an FPB Bank affiliate in Miami.” Might that have been Pine Bank, of 1001 Brickell Bay Drive? Paulucci was that bank’s president and CEO. In 2006 he came to that institution from a job running the Israeli firm Bank Leumi operations in Florida, and quickly Pine Bank was hit with a cease and desist order by the US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which accused Pine Bank of violating various anti-money laundering provisions of the federal Bank Secrecy Act. At least six other South Florida banks were hit with similar orders at the time.

Anonymous ownership, apparently absentee management — a strange bank with which to do business, except if there is some special purpose.

And what’s in a name? “Brickell” is an upscale part of Miami and its name is on many a company, most prominently Brickell Group Construction LLC. There is The Brickell Group SA in Buenos Aires, a construction company incorporated in Argentina in 2007. Brickell is the name of a Brazilian kitchenware company. No obvious and certain relationships between these companies and the ones associated with Pinhiero and Paulucci come up in a quick online search. But then, construction and household goods made of plastic in Brazil? One might imagine some business ties with Odebrecht and its Braskem joint venture.

What about FPB? In Hong Kong the First Pacific Bank that uses those initials. FPB Bank Inc in Panama is just over 10 years old, while the bank in Hong Kong, since sold, was the property of FPB Bank Holding Company Limited, company registered in Bermuda in 1993.

“Mirror companies,” upstart firms taking on the same or similar names of better known companies elsewhere in the world, are legal in Panama and are one of the telltale indicators of possible fraud. Due diligence that finds a researched firm that mirrors somebody older and better known tells a prudent investor to run away.

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Bone of contention

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Line 2
A large poster in the national bus terminal, about a major public work in progress.

Bone of contention

note and photo by Eric Jackson

On Friday, February 10, members of the SUNTRACS construction workers union, whose leaders are part of the November 29th National Liberation Movement (MLN-29), along with other groups in that political group — the Revolutionary Student Front (FER-29), the National Front for the Defense of Economic and Social Rights (FRENADESO) and the Broad Front for Democracy political party (FAD) — blocked streets in the metro area and some other parts of Panama. It was billed as a protest against corruption but this faction of the left has had little to say about Odebrecht as the national and international bribery scandal has been brewing.

So what’s THAT all about? Odebrecht is a conglomerate but at the center of it is one of the world’s largest construction companies. For their public works projects here — under great suspicion of having been procured by bribery — the people who do the actual work are construction workers represented by SUNTRACS. Throw Odebrecht off the job and it might entail something that union leader Saúl Méndez is warning about, disruption of the job with layoffs for workers whom he represents.

But what’s a commie radical movement to do when all the other commie radicals — as well as most business and conservative groups in the country — are protesting about the systematic government corruption of which Odebrecht is the poster child?

Well, call out SUNTRACS and friends to block traffic to protest corruption on a Friday. That sort of covers the movement from allegations of being soft on corruption, and after the morning’s protests are over gives the union rank-and-file a longer weekend.

The big Odebrecht project now underway is Line 2 of the Metro commuter train system. It would be disruptive to throw the confessed criminal company off the job, but as they do a lot of the work through subcontractors giving them the boot may not have to involve a shutdown of the project. It would largely depend on how the government managed any expulsion of the Brazilian company.

 

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