“He would only say ‘hello’ very respectfully,” said German Sanchez, who lived next door for 16 years. “You may think what you like of Noriega, but we can’t say he was anything but respectful toward his neighbors.”
“The humble, the poor, the blacks, they are the utmost authority,” Noriega said in one speech.
While some resentment lingers over the U.S. invasion, Noriega has so few supporters in modern-day Panama that attempts to auction off his old home attracted no bidders and the government decided to demolish the decaying building.
“He is not a figure with political possibilities,” University of Panama sociologist Raul Leis said in 2008. “Even though there’s a small sector that yearns for the Noriega era, it is not a representative figure in the country.”
Noriega broke a long silence in June 2015 when he made a statement from prison on Panamanian television to ask forgiveness of those harmed by his regime.
“I feel like as Christians we all have to forgive,” he said, reading from a handwritten statement. “The Panamanian people have already overcome this period of dictatorship.”
