Bananama Republic (https://www.bananamarepublic.com/tag/finmeccanica/page/2/)
According to Mauro Zuñiga, Martinelli plans to privatize the Social Security, pardon Noriega and use the controversy as cover for an even bigger scandal with Italy than the radar and helicopter bribery.
Hello gringo government! You thought Noriega was bad, turning the country into a branch office of the narco cartels? Think again! Our own Maximo Leader, Ricardo Martinelli, is making Panama a stronghold of the Panamanian-Italian mafia, Canal included!
Martinelli went to Italy, met with Berlusconi and Lavitola and gave them a bunga bunga chick as a present whom he said was his niece. "I come to pay my respect to you, Don Silvio".
Well, that's a first battle won by France right there if you ask us. Who wants to guarantee a loan by a bank as stupid as CitiBank for an even more stupid project - the metro - done by a government that will most likely just steal all the money and leave France holding the bag then anyway?
Italian Paolo Pozzessere sold $300 million of grossly overpriced military equipment to Panama, while his son, Francesco Pozzessere, runs a group of companies with little visible activity or product at all - but they're all in bed with Security Minister Raúl Mulino.
Berlusconi will probably take care of Noriega if Martinelli can keep Valter Lavitola, for whom Italian prosecutors issued an arrest warrant, safe in Panama.