President of AES Distribuidora del Este, Karl Huber defended the maintenance program carried out by the company. He said, "We are not magicians and it would be impossible to correct a problem in 30 years from the night to the morning." The increase in the cost of power and the numerous blackouts have irritated Dominicans. There is concern that the private power companies are trying to compensate for the 400,000 users that do not pay for the service by increasing the bills of those that do pay for the service. Furthermore, the repeated blackouts continue to damage electrical and electronic appliances. Rhadamés Segura, administrator of the Dominican Electricity Corporation, which is the intermediary between companies that generate power, and the distributors, denied that the blackouts are due to deficit in production. He said the CDE has on line more power today than in July. The private companies, AES and Unión Fenosa, took control of distribution on 5 August and 13 August respectively. As of those dates, blackouts of 10-15 hours a day have become common again in the DR.
