Despite the voices united in opposition to his charges that the Central Elections Board (JCE) is preparing an electoral fraud, attorney Marino Vinicio Castillo has identified the civic group known as the Citizen Participation Movement (MPC), as a JCE collaborator. Castillo presented a deposition to the attorney general yesterday in which he charges the MPC with violating law 4701, which requires national entities receiving funds from foreign governments to register with the attorney general and provide an accounting of how such funds are spent. MPC, according to Castillo, has been receiving funds from the U.S., including a US$1 million grant authorized by the U.S. congress in February. "Dominican society needs to be made aware of the use to which such funds are put within the country," he said. Alvarez Valdez, the head of MPC dismissed Castillo’s charge that his organization is somehow collaborating with the JCE and the PRD party to deprive thousands of people of their vote. He also stated that MPC is not subject to law 4701 since it doesn’t report anything to the U.S. government. MPC receives financial support from national and international sources who are "interested in the welfare of the nation’s democracy," he said. During the 1996 and 1998 elections, MPC positioned thousands of unsalaried observors at polling stations around the country. A list of 7,500 observors has now been compiled for the elections of 2000. Castillo, who holds the position of anti-drug czar in the Fernandez government, also heads his own small political party, Progressive Force (FP), and has been its some time presidential candidate. As reported yesterday, spokesmen for all the major political parties, as well a ranking U.S. embassy official and a Roman Catholic bishop have rejected his allegations that the JCE is concocting an electoral fraud.
