Laurentino Cortizo, former president of Panama, is accused of embezzlement

Panama City. A complaint for embezzlement against former Panamanian President Laurentino Cortizo (2019-2024) was filed today with the Public Prosecutor’s Office to question the whereabouts of $562.8 million that a mining company paid to the State.

According to the lawyer Heraclio Bustamante, in charge of the case, the issue arose after the current president, José Raúl Mulino, in his usual Thursday press conference, in response to questions from journalists, said that the amount did not end up in a reserve fund, but was used by the previous administration, without further details.

Mulino told reporters at the Palacio de las Garzas (headquarters of the Executive) that these funds do not exist, so it is necessary to investigate their destination.

Bustamante stressed that the amount was supposedly deposited in the National Treasury account and that it is imperative to know who authorized its use and determine the projects or activities for which it was allocated.

The Minera Panamá company, a subsidiary of the Canadian multinational First Quantum, mines copper in the town of Donoso (Colón), but has stopped operations since November 2023 following a ruling by the Supreme Court of Justice that declared a contract signed with the Executive unconstitutional and the intense popular protests that paralyzed the country against open-pit metal mining.

According to Bustamante, the money disappeared just after the end of the electoral campaign in which the Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) made a large financial investment to try to stay in power.

The complaint states that the irregular handling of these funds may constitute a crime of embezzlement and that all officials related to his administration should be investigated, including the former head of state, as well as other officials such as the former Minister of Economy and Finance, Héctor Alexander.

The news surprised the population, since, in the previous administration, after the Supreme Court’s ruling on the mining contract, the last thing that was known was that the money had been deposited in a savings account, words said by Cortizo himself.

Another of the plaintiffs’ lawyers, José Antonio Moncada, said that the more than 500 million dollars that disappeared belong to the people, so an investigation should be made into what they were invested in, or they should be returned to the sovereign.

In November 2023, Minera Panamá paid the sum of 562.8 million dollars corresponding to the tax obligations for the periods from December 2021 to October 2023.