About 85% of the people in the country are Catholics and the remaining 15% Protestants. Baseball is the most common sports in the country, along with boxing and soccer.
Manuel Noriega:
Manuel Noriega was born in a poor section of Panama City in 1934. He graduated the school Chorrios Military Academy in Peru in 1962 with a degree in engineering. Returning to Panama, he became a sub lieutenant in the National Guard. He became involved with U.S. intelligence activities. In 1971 he went to Havana, Cuba, at the request of U.S. president Richard Nixon to obtain the release of crewmen of two American ships seized by Fidel Castro's government. At this time Noriega was already involved in drug deals. A high-ranking drug enforcement officer recommended that President Nixon order Noriega's assassination, but Nixon did not follow through. As head of G-2, Panama's military intelligence command, Noriega was the second most powerful man in Panama. In 1975 G-2 agents rounded up businessmen who took away his property, and sent him to exile in Ecuador. In June 1987 Noriega's former chief of staff, Colonel Roberto Diaz Herrera, stated that Noriega had fixed the 1984 election and ordered the killing of Hugo Spadafora, who had publicly accused