The best news item of the last few days has not been the "strike" which was a "stoppage or protest". NO! The big item was the "Armored Jeepeta" which made Hippo get off from his dominoes game and his visiting friends, supermarkets stints and parade show of his 50 jeepeta motorcade.
Z-101FM's Julio Martinez Pozo denounced in Gobierno de La Ma?ana that a government palace high official brought in an armored jeepeta irregularly(meaning not paying customs) which cost US$150,000 to armor. President Hippo called to stations' hotline for a personal rebuttal of the story saying that Julio was lying and demanded the name of the official, or face being jailed.
In this whole episode a lot of things have come to fruition:
First: Hippo has shown he has nothing better to do than listen to radio programs , play dominoes, hitting people with "cocotazos", giving hi-fives, cutting ribbons, visiting friends and supermarkets as well as scolding people in the streets.
Second: The U.S. Embassy got into the fracas because the rumor mill in the streets was that the famous jeepeta was brought in by the Embassy for George Bush's(father) visit to DR today. The Embassy denied this. Now the joke on the embassy is that Bush came in not today, but yesterday and that he already had his lunch meeting with Hippo and multimillionaire Cisneros, or so it has been said all over the radio. That has placed the newspapers in a quandary, because they look like fools saying he is coming today. And the Embassy's security system out in the open since now everyone knows that they fake the dates, places and hours for security reasons, something that is just routine.
The Embassy was afraid for Bush's security in view of the Middle East situation and that we at DR have been now penetrated by elements from Al Qaeida. Very creditable reports now say that it was an intelligence agency that brought in the jeepeta for Bush. nevertheless, Bush is riding on an armored vehicle regardless of who brought it in. This has been confirmed by Victor Gomez Casanova by a simple call to contacts in U.S. secutiy agencies.
Then today, El Diario Libre claims that a red armored jeepeta was brought in this week by a big shot Reformist Party presidential hopeful who went to see Hippo about getting it free of custom duties and Hippo gave him a hand by assigning two of his closest aides to help him. He got the jeepeta out of customs with little trouble. See the last page of Diario Libre for this.
As it is now public, Hippo's PPH group is trying to buy the Reformist Party's big shots with special favors to offset Leonel Fernandez' almost unstoppable on-rushing freight train, which they fear will run over the PRD in next year's elections. The Reformist Party's boys are taking everything Hippo hands them, since according to Casanova, leader of the Reformist Party's Youth these old hacks are as corrupt as the PRD officials, if not more and are selling his own party.
Now who is the lucky Jeepeta man? Well, if it's not Bush or a PRD big shot, but it is a Reformist candidate, the list is very short and it includes a Santiago candidate(the only one)who sometimes has been confused with a wolfman because of his looks and hair or, a recent elected Chief of all Municipal governments supported by Hippo and his crew who looks like Mickey Mouse with a suit, a dark horse dark skin candidate(all the others are white) who doesn't stand a chance because he is a "chopo", or a big fat candidate that looks like a pregnant pig and is in the automobile business(who else?) and had to sell his dealership because he owed too much money for the campaign or a San Pedro tall white guy who is too young to aspire, but needs the exposure, also in it a balding young leader who has been leader of his party for several years and used the campaign slogan "presente" for "presidente" in last years' election even though he was not running , and the last is another super dark horse whose name rhymes with Caram-ba.
Third: Now we all know, from government sources that many industrialists and millionaires are importing armored cars and vehicles and the question is, are they paying duties or using exemptions bought from government officials, the way the Reformist man did when he bought it from a Dominican diplomat stationed in Europe.
Shall we call this ....the "Armorgate"?
TW
Z-101FM's Julio Martinez Pozo denounced in Gobierno de La Ma?ana that a government palace high official brought in an armored jeepeta irregularly(meaning not paying customs) which cost US$150,000 to armor. President Hippo called to stations' hotline for a personal rebuttal of the story saying that Julio was lying and demanded the name of the official, or face being jailed.
In this whole episode a lot of things have come to fruition:
First: Hippo has shown he has nothing better to do than listen to radio programs , play dominoes, hitting people with "cocotazos", giving hi-fives, cutting ribbons, visiting friends and supermarkets as well as scolding people in the streets.
Second: The U.S. Embassy got into the fracas because the rumor mill in the streets was that the famous jeepeta was brought in by the Embassy for George Bush's(father) visit to DR today. The Embassy denied this. Now the joke on the embassy is that Bush came in not today, but yesterday and that he already had his lunch meeting with Hippo and multimillionaire Cisneros, or so it has been said all over the radio. That has placed the newspapers in a quandary, because they look like fools saying he is coming today. And the Embassy's security system out in the open since now everyone knows that they fake the dates, places and hours for security reasons, something that is just routine.
The Embassy was afraid for Bush's security in view of the Middle East situation and that we at DR have been now penetrated by elements from Al Qaeida. Very creditable reports now say that it was an intelligence agency that brought in the jeepeta for Bush. nevertheless, Bush is riding on an armored vehicle regardless of who brought it in. This has been confirmed by Victor Gomez Casanova by a simple call to contacts in U.S. secutiy agencies.
Then today, El Diario Libre claims that a red armored jeepeta was brought in this week by a big shot Reformist Party presidential hopeful who went to see Hippo about getting it free of custom duties and Hippo gave him a hand by assigning two of his closest aides to help him. He got the jeepeta out of customs with little trouble. See the last page of Diario Libre for this.
As it is now public, Hippo's PPH group is trying to buy the Reformist Party's big shots with special favors to offset Leonel Fernandez' almost unstoppable on-rushing freight train, which they fear will run over the PRD in next year's elections. The Reformist Party's boys are taking everything Hippo hands them, since according to Casanova, leader of the Reformist Party's Youth these old hacks are as corrupt as the PRD officials, if not more and are selling his own party.
Now who is the lucky Jeepeta man? Well, if it's not Bush or a PRD big shot, but it is a Reformist candidate, the list is very short and it includes a Santiago candidate(the only one)who sometimes has been confused with a wolfman because of his looks and hair or, a recent elected Chief of all Municipal governments supported by Hippo and his crew who looks like Mickey Mouse with a suit, a dark horse dark skin candidate(all the others are white) who doesn't stand a chance because he is a "chopo", or a big fat candidate that looks like a pregnant pig and is in the automobile business(who else?) and had to sell his dealership because he owed too much money for the campaign or a San Pedro tall white guy who is too young to aspire, but needs the exposure, also in it a balding young leader who has been leader of his party for several years and used the campaign slogan "presente" for "presidente" in last years' election even though he was not running , and the last is another super dark horse whose name rhymes with Caram-ba.
Third: Now we all know, from government sources that many industrialists and millionaires are importing armored cars and vehicles and the question is, are they paying duties or using exemptions bought from government officials, the way the Reformist man did when he bought it from a Dominican diplomat stationed in Europe.
Shall we call this ....the "Armorgate"?
TW