The accusation of blackmail hanging over the Spanish construction company Sacyr in its proceedings related to the Canal expansion, casts a shadow over all firms of the same nationality.
An article printed in Spanish media outlet Invertia.com says "concerns of Spanish employers established in Panama have increased after the Canal Administrator Jorge Luis Quijano, censored the behavior of the construction firm Sacyr."
The construction consortium has rejected the proposed solutions one by one, as they know that being replaced would be more expensive for the ACP than to acquiesce to its demands.
EDITORIAL
The alleged light at the end of the tunnel that led to an agreement in principle to resolve the alleged illiquidity of Grupo Unidos por el Canal (GUPC), was dimmed when the consortium led by Sacyr and Impregilo returned to its extremist position: Pay the overruns of $1.6 billion, or the works will be halted.
The construction consortium has not carried out its threat to stop construction work at the end of the prescribed period, while Canal Administration prepares to take on the project.
And on Monday there were revelations of another proposal by consortium Grupo Unidos por el Canal (GUPC) for the continuation of the work, which was that the parties in conflict co-finance the so-called contingency costs, while they wait for a decision from the arbitration proceedings established in the contract, over who should pay.
When companies from different countries come together to develop large-scale projects, the work will inevitably be affected by conflicts generated by cultural differences.
In today's world it is not strange that the punctuality of the English or the precision of the Swiss is a surprise to a Latin American.
These cultural differences are also reflected in the working methods of companies who join up in order to develop projects where often a lack of agreement or communication problems delay the progress of projects .
Having glossed over the Bechtel report on technical deficiencies in the very cheap proposal made by Grupo Unidos por el Canal for the Canal expansion, the project could now turn out to be very expensive for the ACP.
At the time of the award of the construction works on the Panama Canal expansion to the consortium Grupo Unidos por el Canal (GUPC), the efforts made by the U.S.
The facts seem to bear out what was said in 2009 -according to WikiLeaks- by the U.S. ambassador, who described Sacyr as "a bankrupt company sustained only by the Spanish government."
The dialogue regarding the cost overruns in the construction of the canal expansion project between the Panama Canal Authority (ACP) and the consortium Grupo Unidos por el Canal (GUPC)-initiated by the intervention of the Spanish Minister of Development- has been interrupted, and it is not longer the Spanish group Sacyr the spokeshead but instead it is now the other majority company in the Consortium, Italy's Impregilo, which is asking - via the media- for $1 billion from the ACP, while keeping up its threat to stop the work.
The threat of paralyzing the work of the third set of locks of the Panama Canal is keeping maritime and port operators around the world on tenterhooks.
The conflict between the construction consortium (GUPC) headed by the Spanish Sacyr and the Panama Canal Authority (ACP), which originated over the demand for the first payment of $1.6 billion in cost overruns and the ACP's rejection of that claim, threatens to extend the opening of the expanded waterway, through which 5% of the world's maritime cargo passes, to beyond 2015.
The construction of the third set of locks at the Panama Canal will require over 7.500 workers in five years.
"The figures are provided by Grupo Unidos por el Canal, winner of the design and construction contracts for the third set of locks", said Alberto Alemán Zubieta, head of the Panama Canal Administration.