Several delegations are working to reschedule the Dominican government’s debts with foreign creditors. The first delegation went to Washington, DC to talk with IMF officials about rearranging debt with the Paris Club, an informal group of official creditors whose role is to find coordinated and sustainable solutions to the payment difficulties experienced by debtor nations. Rescheduling is a means of providing a country with debt relief through a postponement.
According to the sources of Candida Acosta of the Listin Diario, the Dominican Republic is facing payments of US$158 million to the Club. US$129 million is principle and US$29 million is interest. This mission is being led by Central Bank officials, as they visit lawyers and investment bank officials as part of the preliminary steps towards renegotiating the payment schedule. Another delegation, headed by Andy Dauhajre Jr, Jaime Aristy Escuder and Superintendent of Electricity George Reynoso, arrived in Washington to discuss electricity problems with the World Bank. Representatives from the power generation sector, including Rolando Gonzalez Bunster and officials from Ege-Haina, are also accompanying the government team. The source told the Listin Diario that the mission is looking for some preventive mechanism that will avert a collapse of the domestic business sector that had accumulated its debts in dollars when the economy was robust and the dollar sat stably at less than RD$20. Yesterday, the currency was being quoted at RD$45 to US$1, but today it had jumped 10 points back to US$55 to US$1.