Petaquilla Minerals Ltd. (fka PTQMF)

[Chileanmafia]

Here in Panama the people do not really have a clear picture of what modern large scale mining looks like - here people have experience in agriculture, the canal, banking and tourism - so its relatively new.

That said there is a very large group of Indians here that have educated themselves about mining and are putting pressure on the government to share the Cerro Colorado concession which is located on their indian reserve - I suspect these Indians will get what they want in the end as there are 170,000 of them living there and Martinelli will not want an ugly fight with them going into the 2014 election.

It is also important to understand that the public education system here is very poor and the rich run the country and there a few families that have a lot influence.

What you read in the news is usually about interest - often you will read stories that over state the number of protesters or overstate facts or they are not interested in acquiring the facts.

What I have also seen is that the two main mining companies have not done a very good job in educating the masses about mining here - its not hard or expensive to do so - Panama is a small country with 3.2 million people and the majority live in and around Panama City - perhaps if PTQ and Inmet did more to educate the masses the industry would be seen in a better light.

A final note to mention - metallic mining is also not that important yet to the economy, but once Inmet and Cerro Colorado get moving that will change in a hurry.

Always remember that Panama moves on interest - if your read something or something is moving forward there is always an interest behind it....