Hugo Spadafora Franco (Chitré, September 6, 1940 - La Concepción, September 13, 1985) was a Panamanian military, physician, activist and adventurer.
Spadafora studied medicine at the University of Bologna and, after graduating, went to Guinea-Bissau to support the independence fighters against Portugal. In 1975 he returned to Panama where he became Minister of Health in Omar Torrijos military regime. In 1978, he went to Nicaragua to combat the dictatorship of the Somoza family with a Panamerian army on the side of the Sandinist National Liberation Front (FSLN). A few years after the Sandinist victory, he joined Edena Pastora from the FSLN, because it would have become too undemocratic and corrupt, and fought with Pastor's Revolutionary Front Sandino (FRS).
In the mid 80's, Spadafora became involved in the politics of his motherland as a critic of military dictator Manuel Noriega, accusing him of drug trafficking. In September 1985, Spadafora entered Panama from Panama, but was captured just after the border by Panamanian soldiers. A few days later, his terrible mutilated body was found in a trick in Costa Rica. After protests in Panam, President Nicolás Ardito Barletta, a puppet of Noriega, decided to investigate Spadafora's death, after which Noriega was resigned. After the fall of Noriega in 1989, a Panamanian judge Noriega was guilty of the murder of Spadafora in absentia.
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