Audits are not an option but a duty said Panama’s Comptroller, Federico Humbert on Thursday, March 15 reacting  to deputies facing investigation, of suspected mismanagement of public funds during the 2014 election.

The Comptroller audited the country's communal boards and found a possible patrimonial injury for $319 million. In his investigation, he concluded that all the deputies of the National Assembly in the five-year period 2009-2014 moved money and managed it through the communal boards and municipalities.

A group of re-elected lawmakers has filed interventions to try to block criminal probes after the audit. “What we present has clear indications that the funds were mishandled. I am surprised that an appeal for an audit so well done is filed. As far as my team is concerned, we have acted protected in what the law obliges us,” said  Humbert

He added that if the auditors  have to defend themselves they will do it, “because their work is well done and 'the Comptroller does not work on a pressure basis, but on what the citizenship demands.”

Deputy  Ana Matilde Gómez, former Attorney General and member of the  Assembly Credentials Commission said that an Amparo always seeks to stop an act.  In her opinion, the Comptroller's Office does have the right to do the investigation. “I understand that the comptroller did audit the community boards, so I do not see the validity of the Amparo, although it will be the Court that will have to settle on that. A deputy is not the one who determines the validity of an act or its legality, " she said.

Former Comptroller  José Chen Barría said “The Constitution authorizes the comptroller to carry out investigations where it considers necessary to preserve the State's resources. Neither the president nor the magistrates or the deputies are above the Law and cannot be exempt from the eye of the Comptroller if they handled public funds.".

According to his analysis, a dual investigation must be carried out: in what corresponds to the representatives of corregimiento or communal boards, they should be investigated by the ordinary courts and the Public Ministry. In this sense, there should be 186 investigations and an equal number of processes. On the other hand, the  Supreme Court must deal with the deputies.

Meanwhile the president of the Assembly, Yanibel Ábrego,  who was among those filing an Amparo,  on Wednesday. withdrew it   the next day