The National Confederation of Independent Trade Union Unity (CONUSI), indicated this Monday, October 24, that “indignation and national stupor has caused the dissemination of information about the so-called economic aid granted by the IFARHU to children and relatives of deputies, senior officials and even wealthy Club Union. All ‘duly’ endorsed by the Comptroller General of the Republic, Gerardo Solís».
They state that they are privileged people whose parents bleed the national budget with high emoluments, in addition to being many involved in scandals of theft from the public treasury and corruption.
«This economic aid is an offense to the working people and thousands of humble students who make an effort to study and obtain brilliant grades, but who, because they do not have “godparents” or closeness to influential figures (politicians or businessmen), are denied the opportunity to a scholarship, truncating his future. There are thousands and thousands of known stories », he expressed.
The union points out that this is the reflection of a decadent society, model and style of governing. “Everything has to be transformed from the root. It’s up to the people and the workers to do it. Never more of the same.
They demand the cancellation of these so-called aid. An external and independent audit of all the scholarships granted, an exhaustive investigation of the facts and the people involved, including the Comptroller General of the Republic who, according to them, has been an accomplice in this and many other cases of corruption in the Government. They ask that those responsible be prosecuted and penalized.
“Not even working their whole lives, the vast majority of workers who earn salaries of 600 balboas or less would reach the 190 thousand balboas granted as economic aid by IFARHU, for example, to the son of deputy Roberto Ábrego, who is also lawyer, merchant and member of the board of directors of the Panama Canal and who charges more than 1,200 balboas per meeting per diem. And there may be higher “helps”. A worker with 600 balboas of salary or less would have to work at least 27 continuous years, that is, 324 contributions from the Social Security Fund, much more than the minimum required to retire today, “he added.
They called on the people and the workers “to repudiate this embezzlement of public funds in the streets. This town can’t take it anymore.”
