| Daily News - Wednesday, 25 August 2004 |
President Leonel Fernandez continued his hectic pace of filling the jobs to be vacated by the PRD faithful. In 43 decrees that range from numbers 943 to 986, he placed assistant prosecutors and district attorneys for most of the country.
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Fernandez also placed a few more generals in retirement, among them Rafael Ramirez Vidal and Steylo Luciano Sanchez, along with Colonel Fausto Tiburcio Batista. The Batalla de las Carreras military academy was also given a new director. Colonel Luis Ramon Payan Arache was promoted to the rank of general for the new job and so was Colonel Antonio Jaquez Lopez, as the new director of the General Juan Pablo Duarte Military Institute for Higher Education. Another academic appointment went to the newly-promoted General Gilberto Santiago Delgado, who was named director of the Institute for Higher Defense and National Security Studies.
The President’s economic team visited the Chamber of Deputies last night to begin negotiations on several modifications they want made in the tax package. The reform legislation is currently being studied by the Chamber’s Finance Commission that is headed by Deputy Marino Collante. While just yesterday Collante expressed his confidence that the reform was on the brink of being ratified, today’s El Caribe says that yesterday’s visit has stalled the bill’s passage and brought about the formation of a bilateral commission to review the reports made by the Finance Commission. A group consisting of Presidential Minister for Technical Affairs Temistocles Montas, Banking Superintendent Rafael Camilo, Presidential economic advisor Julio Ortega and Internal Revenue director Juan Hernandez met with the Chamber’s president, Alfredo Pacheco, and Collante’s commission. Despite the fact that the commission had everything ready for a final vote in the Chamber, and that Pacheco had summoned today’s session to take the vote, there is still no consensus between the legislative and executive branches. Montas told reporters, “We are going to refine some things because we need to promote a revision in order for things to be done in the best way….There are some recommendations, but these will be made during talks with the new commission that is to be named by the president of the Chamber of Deputies.” The bilateral commission will include members of the economic team as well as members of the Finance Commission of the lower house.
And with the potential to further complicate matters, a request has been made by the PRSC party to include 15 of their modifications in the legislation. According to Hoy, the PRSC is proposing an overall salary increase of 30% for 2005, and a 16% tax on insurance policies, also for 2005.
President Leonel Fernandez has suspended the pensions awarded by former President Hipolito Mejia to public servants and civilians during 2004. El Caribe reports that Fernandez has instructed the Finance Ministry to analyze the pension amounts disbursed under the Mejia administration, which were the object of much scrutiny by the local press. At the same time, Fernandez designated the public prosecutors for several provinces, including Espaillat (Moca), and El Seybo. Decree 930-04 named more members to the Board of Directors of the Banco de Reservas de la Republica Dominicana (Banreservas). Decree 931-04 named the regional police commandants, as well as the most important department heads.
Environment Minister Max Puig announced yesterday that his department would conduct a review of the contentious and widely-opposed Sectoral Law on Protected Areas. As Laura Martinez writes for Diario Libre, the minister said his people would examine the process in which the legislation was created, as well as its Congressional approval. According to Puig, the process was full of “accidents.” The newly-appointed minister acknowledged that a decision from the Supreme Court is still pending on the case as presented on 9 August by the Coalition for the Defense of the Protected Areas, whose issue with the bill regards its constitutionality. The statements from the minister came during the close of a workshop on “Trans-frontier Aquifers of the Island of Hispanola” that was sponsored by UNESCO and other international organizations.
An unusually reticent and diplomatic US Ambassador Hans Hertell visited the DR’s new attorney general, Francisco Dominguez Brito, yesterday, where the two discussed local initiatives to combat drug trafficking and organized crime. The digital edition of El Caribe says that Hertell requested the extradition of several individuals, but did not specify who they were. Hoy newspaper says that cooperation with the Drug Enforcement Agency was one of the chief topics of the conversation, but Hertell limited his comments to saying he was an old friend of Dominguez Brito and was merely wishing his friend success at his new post. When reporters asked if there were any former government officials on the list of extraditions requested by the United States, the ambassador said the reporters could read the communiques issued at the United States Embassy. Dominguez Brito also met with reporters and told them of his plans to work in conjunction with the United States in its fight against organized crime.
The Dominican Refinery (REFIDOMSA) suspended propane service last Friday, a move that has caused much consternation for homemakers and transportation workers. If service is not resumed today, the crisis could become very serious. Hundreds of tank-truck drivers made their way to the refinery’s gates yesterday upon hearing the news that a shipment was due in port. Meanwhile, the head of the Association of Distributors of LPG (liquid propane gas), Wilfredo Melo Alcantara, told reporters that the difficulties in supplying the country with propane fuel will continue until imports match the daily demand of 750,000 gallons. The spokesperson even agreed that the government should gradually reduce the subsidy that is currently calculated at RD$37 per gallon of propane. The largest importers of propane are the Refinery and Coastal, who together control 90% of the imports, while Mundogas supplies the balance. Coastal is the principal supplier for Tropigas and Propagas outlets. According to the tanker drivers, there are 180 tank trucks awaiting the arrival of more propane. The refinery is able to dispatch as many as 90 trucks on a good day.
Although approximately half of the buses belonging to the OMSA transport organization are out of service, the remaining 250-300 units were circulating yesterday, according to Hoy, helping Dominicans get to their jobs and back home again. An unnamed source told the newspaper that there should be 500 buses operating in Santo Domingo today and about 150 in Santiago, depending on what “Ditren says,” a reference to Ignacio Ditren, the original head of OMSA in 1996 who was returned to the post this week by President Fernandez’s appointment. The source also denied that the former administrator of OMSA, Diogenes Castillo, had left many debts with suppliers unpaid, as was being speculated. By noon yesterday, however, hundreds of PLD sympathizers had gathered to taunt the OMSA workers, calling on them to resign and go home. In a long interview published in El Caribe, Ditren said that when he left OMSA in 2000, there were 600 buses and 2,800 employees – about 4.7 employees per bus – and one of his goals is to reach this proportion again. Currently there are 6,000 employees on the payroll at OMSA, a ratio of 20 employees per bus. When asked how many buses OMSA had, Ditren said he did not have exact figures but that many of the Pan American Games buses, complete with air-conditioning, were in service, while most of the Mercedes-Benz buses were not. According to the head of the transport service, the actual cost to ride a bus lies between RD$17 and RD$18 because there are only two hundred or so buses circulating and 926 drivers and collectors on the payrolls. The current fare for passengers is RD$5, which Ditren aims to maintain. Ditren said that in Santiago there are supposed to be 126 buses operating, but only 35 are presently on the streets. He said that in the coming days he would open the OMSA garages and parking lots to the press so they could see the state of the equipment for themselves.
Health care for tourists is turning into a highly lucrative business, in spite of its potential to damage the DR’s image as a safe tourist destination. Annet Cardenas, a reporter for the Diario Libre, discovered that some of the highest-priced services were found at the two clinics run by Hospiten in this country: one in Bavaro and the other in Santo Domingo. Nearly all of the hotels in the Bavaro area have equipped offices for the services of Hospiten personnel, and most patients are moved in Hospiten ambulances to the Hospiten clinic at a cost of US$350. Abdominal pains cost one tourist US$125 and a fractured toe caused another to be brought “urgently” to Santo Domingo and treated for US$701. The medical case of one young Italian is as sad as his death. A hospital bill of RD$1,323,679.79 included a daily fee for intensive care that ascended to RD$34,680 and consults that varied between RD$9,180 and RD$16,830. Many tour operators are worried about these high costs, as they could cause higher insurance premiums needed to travel to the Dominican Republic. There was a general acceptance of the high quality of the service and the professional care that the patients received, however. In spite of their uneasiness over the situation, none of the tour operators could be identified for fear that Hospiten would take them off of their service list. According to the reporter, the excessively high fees that Hospiten charges have allowed the Spanish company to pay rents and commissions to the hotels that use their services and have successively driven out smaller medical practitioners from the area. Some, such as the Bournigal, Dr Correa and Dr Canela clinics, have simply relocated to other areas, while others, such as Toursmed, SA, have disappeared altogether.
The members of the defeated PPH faction of the PRD have only the National Congress to turn to for new jobs, according to the author of the “De buena tinta” column in today’s Diario Libre. He says that Alfredo Pacheco and Andres Bautista, the leaders of the lower and upper houses of Congress, are now learning what it is like to become the opposition party. Since 17 August, PPH faction members have virtually taken over the hallways and offices of the Congressional leaders, as they search for “their piece of the patronage pie.” A horde of ex-government employees, among whom are many journalists unable to continue “sucking air,” is exerting huge pressure on the leaders of each Congressional house in order to find a place in the only prestigious body left in the government bureaucracy under PRD control. Previously, a possible refuge might have been the Santo Domingo municipal government or the Municipal League, but both of these are in the opponents’ hands now. They similarly cannot go to the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo (UASD), since it is controlled by another party. In the face of all of this pressure, it seems that the head of the Chamber of Deputies and the president of the Senate will have to put some people in retirement and perhaps fire a few others to make way for the “comesiempres” - a play on the term “come solo” given to the PLD members in the last administration. “Comesiempre” refers to those who are always eating, as opposed to those who eat alone. New appointments for consultants to the Congress should not cause any surprise in the coming days.
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