British Members of Parliament George Foulkes and Baroness Gloria Hooper from the House of Lords, and Bob Blizzard and Robert Spink from the House of Commons, will meet with President Leonel Fernandez and Foreign Relations Minister Carlos Morales Troncoso after their arrival in Santo Domingo today. They are visiting the country with a large delegation from the British construction, trade, tourism and real estate sectors, to study investment opportunities in the DR.
President Leonel Fernandez is to meet with the industrial free trade zone managers and owners from around the country next Monday to plan new strategies aimed at increasing the sector's competitiveness, which decreased by 8% during the first semester of this year. Diario Libre reports that the meeting will take place at the Gran Almirante Hotel in Santiago. The President will be accompanied by the Central Bank Governor, the Minister of the Presidency, the Industry and Commerce Minister, the Presidential Technical Minister, the Labor Minister and the directors of Customs and Industrial Promotion, among other officials.
The Ad-Interim Charge d'Affaires at the French Embassy, Jean-Francois Bazin, has called the statements attributed by the press to French Ambassador Cecile Pozzo di Borgo, as manipulations. In a letter sent to Foreign Relations Minister Carlos Morales Troncoso, the diplomat said that the ambassador "never expressed any complaint or mentioned weaknesses about justice protection of investments". Diario Libre reports that Bazin also points out the "curious coincidence" that this should happen when the ambassador is out of the country, and he regrets that this situation has occurred just weeks before the meeting between Presidents Leonel Fernandez and Jacques Chirac scheduled for 13 November in Paris. The Ministry of Foreign Relations said that it was satisfied with the embassy's explanations.
Cardinal Lopez Rodriguez has demanded that ambassadors accredited in the Dominican Republic should not refer to the country or the government in derogatory terms. According to Lopez Rodriguez, it is preferable that diplomats proceed through established diplomatic channels. He believes that the diplomatic style that is being employed is not the one in use in the Dominican Republic and stated that there are normal channels for expressing complaints. The leader of the Roman Catholic Church has traditionally been a zealous defender of national interests when he feels there have been excesses on the part of foreigners.
Deputies attended a course on etiquette yesterday, which according to Diario Libre was aimed at helping them to learn how to behave at public and private functions, table manners, and to dress correctly for every occasion. The course was held under the auspices of the Chamber of Deputies and the Ministry of Foreign Relations and was conducted by Mrs. Rebeca Galan de Vicioso. The deputies also attended a course on "Diplomatic Practice and Drafting" by Juan Jose Hernandez, and another on "Organization of Summits and International Events" by Jesus Maria Hernandez.
Members of the former Senate spent more than RD$7 million monthly on their payroll of assistants, funded by taxpayers' money. A total of 817 people were employed by the Senators, according to a report by Clave weekly newspaper. Many of these employees did not carry out any specific functions. Some were relatives of the Senators. Most received salaries of between RD$1,080 to RD$10,000 per month, although in some exceptional cases, monthly salaries of RD$14,000, RD$16,000, RD$20,000 and even RD$30,000 were paid. The two Senators with the largest amount of funds assigned to their personal payrolls were Andres Bautista Garcia (Espaillat) with RD$620,695 monthly, Jesus Vasquez Martinez (Nagua) with RD$445,765 monthly, and Cesar Diaz Filpo (Azua) with RD$455,100 monthly.
The Police, the Attorney General's Department and the US Immigration and Customs Execution Agency have dismantled an organization that allegedly laundered approximately US$7.3 million. Three people were arrested in the US and the DR, according to a report by Diario Libre. Transactions by the company Puly Envio de Valores and/or Boston Envio de Valores were tracked as part of the investigation. The company is owned by Dominicans Santo Melo and Claudio Tejeda Andujar. According to the investigation, Melo and Tejeda acted in complicity with another company, Remesadora Peravinter, which is presumed to have operated illegally on Inchaustegui Street in Bani. The members of Remesadora Puly and/or Envio de Valores Boston would receive money in cash in Boston and transfer it electronically to the Dominican Republic. The money was then distributed to drug trafficking cells in both companies through intermediaries who charged 5% to 7%. The authorities in both countries decided to freeze the suspects' bank accounts, seize their property and examine technological equipment at the companies involved. In addition to Santos Melo and Tejeda Andujar, an employee of Puly, Jose Garcia, was arrested in the US. He was found in possession of US$160,000. In the DR, the following have been detained: Marcos Tejeda Andujar, Carlos Manuel Objio Diaz, David Trinidad Tejeda, Silvio Trinidad Tejeda, William Ramirez Asuncion, Francis Amauris Garcia Diaz, David Emilio Castillo Tejeda, Edison Faustino Villalona Ramirez and Luis Bernardo Pimentel. Marcos Tejeda Santana is still at large. During their investigations, Dominican and US authorities used US federal funds to make 25 transfers totaling US$400,000.00 to the DR through Puly Envio de Valores and/or Boston Envio de Valores, which were presented to the organization as the product of drug trafficking activities in the US.
According to the 8th Survey of Business Opinion sponsored by the Santiago Chamber of Commerce and Production, the four basic priorities for this country are: (1) to resolve the energy problem; (2) to fight crime; (2) to improve education; and (4) job creation. The survey concludes that the authorities need to prioritize these four areas in order to improve the quality of life in the DR. The survey was conducted in April and May this year, and it established that 59.22% of the businesspeople interviewed believe that the solution to the electricity deficit must be given urgent attention.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) says that the Dominican government needs to apply force and urgency to the energy sector reform so that subsidies are reduced in a sustainable manner. It also stresses the need to guarantee the government's tax sustainability, which it feels is threatened by the weak performance of collections.
The Santo Domingo Province Court's Criminal Chamber will continue hearing the Plan Renove case today. Twelve former government officials, businessmen and union leaders are accused of fraud against the Dominican state to the tune of over RD$1.8 billion. Judges Olga Herrera Carbuccia, Juan Hirohito Reyes and Manuel del Socorro Perez will determine whether to uphold the original sentence or acquit the accused, ten of whom were already sentenced in the first instance.
The Millennium Objectives for education state that all children who begin elementary education should complete the cycle. However, the United Nations Development Program doubts that this goal will be reached in the DR. The UNDP states that there have been some advances in the country but there has not been success in keeping the children in the educational system. The country needed an investment of US$810 million for the 2005-2006 school year and US$901 million for the following one. However, according to information was published by Clave newspaper, investment in the former was only US$536 million and this year only US$624 million have been allocated.
During the last 25 years, investment in education has never exceeded 3% of the country's Gross National Product, which places the DR among the three Latin American countries with the lowest education spending. This even contravenes the country's own General Education Law, which establishes that the minimum investment in the sector should be 4% of GNP, as reported by Clave weekly newspaper. Average schooling in the DR is 4.8 years, third lowest after Haiti (2.8 years) and Guatemala (3.5 years).
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