President Hipolito Mejia said his government will borrow RD$1,400 million (US$83 million) to pay part of what it owes to private power distributors and generators. In a talk to the nation, President Mejia said that investments of RD$16,000 million are underway to improve the electricity service. He spoke of his government’s plans to reduce costs of power generation and announced an ambitious program to bring electricity to rural communities. He also spoke of the work underway to improve transmission lines by the Dominican Electricity Corporation, the state power utility. He announced that after talks with the distributors and generators, the government agreed to eliminate the RD$238 million a month subsidy it was paying the generators. The President leaves today for a seven-day trip to South America. This is the President’s 17th trip abroad to 21 countries in his first year in government.
