A FORMER  Director of the National  Land  Management Authority (Anati), allegedly received death threats over his refusal to approve changes in property registrations in Bocas del Toro for four farms owned by the company Desarrollo Ecoturístico Cañaveral, S.A. (Decsa).

"Following the decision, I received two death threats: one from a woman and another from a man who told me to stop doing what I was doing, because they were following me, and that they knew what I was trying to do,"  Franklin Oduber told La Prensa.

Although he clarified that he did not file a complaint, he was assigned security from the Institutional Protection Service.

The four farms were acquired in an accelerated processes ­ like seven others ­ that is under investigation by authorities after allegations have surfaced that the registrations were altered to remove them from a protected area in the Comarca Ngäbe Buglé.

Due to the action of Anati, Antonio Alvarez,  one of the legal representatives of Decsa, the deputy and presidential candidate in Costa Rica for the National Liberation Party, sued the Panama government for $100 million.

"I feel very confident … that we are going to win that judgment," Alvarez told  the Costa Rican daily Crhoy.com.

Oduber said that he retained the original plans of the lands to "guarantee the integrity of what was being done," precluding any proceedings in the Public Registry.

"When I heard about the land in Bocas del Toro, which was published in La Prensa at the time, I sent a written communication to the Public Registry to suspend any segregation of the four properties   and to remove the original plans from circulation, Since an irregularity was known," he said.

Oduber as director of Anati, indicated that a review of the location of the farms was made since they were about to deliver a technical report that revealed alleged "irregularities" in the process.

The technical report, which was accessed by La Prensa, highlighted that the plans presented before the Civil Circuit Court of Bocas del Toro were "different" from the original plans.

In addition, there are aerial photographs of the actual location of the farms.

Meanwhile, Oduber affirmed that the purchase of the property did not meet legal standards.

Questions have been raised about the legal decisions in the case so far, as former Anati officials appeared to have benefited from them