2003 – Page 234

Beware: The Metropolitan Transport Authority (AMET) agents are handing out more tickets these days. One city resident who was stopped for a defective front light complained that the officers were picking on the better cars. Apparently turning a blind eye to the thousands of battered taxi cars in circulation and motorcyclists without helmets, the AMET …

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Press reports say that no one in the city government of Santo Domingo has been able to provide any information on who are the people behind the concession to operate proposed parking meters on Santo Domingo city streets. Reportedly, a contract with Parqueos Dominicanos, S.A. establishes a pittance for the city governments while the private …

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The Santo Domingo government of Mayor Robert Salcedo announced over the weekend that it has rescinded the garbage collection contract with Colimec. He also said that Proaseo, another garbage collection company inherited from the past administration, had violated their contract, as it was collecting only 700 to 800 tons of refuse daily of the 1,700 …

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Senator Jose Tomas Perez (PLD) has sent a bill of law to Congress that would give citizens the right to request and receive information from the government. Although government data is legally public information, government officers have traditionally restricted access to centralized and autonomous governmental transactions and to the operations of privatized companies in which …

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Deputy Julio Cesar Valent?n (PLD) alerted that the contracting of loans obliging the country to purchase materials for public works from foreign producers could be very damaging to the country. He said that in many cases local producers could supply the materials more cost-efficiently and that the prices of the imported materials are often padded. …

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Politician Federico Ant?n Batlle has set aside his aspirations to become the Partido Reformista Social Cristiano (PRSC) candidate in the primaries scheduled for 30 March, ceding the path for Jacinto Peynado, who was the party?s presidential candidate in 1996 and is a former Vice President. Another PRSC former Vice President, Carlos Morales had also renounced …

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Economist Eduardo Garc?a Michel, who recently resigned from his post as member of the Monetary Board, writes in the List?n Diario that too many people need yet to become aware that the greatest setback to sustained growth is the lack of a national export culture. On the page dedicated to the Fundaci?n Siglo 21 think …

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After the last-minute cancellation of Shakira?s concert on 19 March, Bancredito published an advertisement assuring its customers that those who had purchased discounted tickets through them would get their money back if they chose not to hold on to the tickets and wait for Shakira?s next performance on 22 May. List?n Diario reports, however, that …

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Last week, Foreign Minister Hugo Tolentino Dipp at a meeting of the Association of Caribbean States declared: ?The commitments of international organizations to keep the peace should not be violated by the unilateral stand of any state, because only the plural and majority?s voice can rightfully make decisions in the name of the international community.? …

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Yesterday some exchange houses were selling US dollars for as much as RD$26 ? a record-breaking price. This latest decline in the peso?s value, described as ?inexplicable? by the government in today’s List?n Diario, continues to cause concern in business and government circles. Finance Minister Jos? Lois Malkum said that the only possible explanation was …

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