The president of the American Chamber of Commerce, Jorge Ivan Ramirez, urged the Dominican government to ?act with caution? in its efforts to solve the current energy crisis. Speaking at the group?s monthly luncheon, Ramirez said the low collection rates of the electric distributors have directly contributed to the lack of financial liquidity that is paralyzing the sector. Ramirez suggested a ?systemic solution that includes all the parties involved: the generators, the government, the distributors, the consumers and the private generators.? Businessman Celso Marranzini said that ?as long as the business of electricity is handled under political criteria, the situation will not get better.? During the luncheon?s featured panel discussion, the head of the National Energy Commission (CNE), Antonio Almonte, rejected the notion of a vertical integration of the energy sector and instead urged that changes be made to the contracts for buying and selling energy. Almonte said the renewal of a vertical electric system, with generation, transmission and distribution under one umbrella, is neither a cause nor a solution to the current problems. Almonte pointed out that in the study carried out by the CNE, a review of the contracts between the CDEEE and the independent power producers (IPPs) for the buying and selling of energy, which were in effect before the capitalization process started, is vital. According to the expert, the revision should uncover clauses in these contracts that call for indexing of prices that bear no relation to the current market cost of operating the generation facilities. A member of the PLD transition team, Francisco Antonio Mendez, said that the government cannot continue to finance electricity to the tune of RD$12 billion a year, although other reports cite a figure of RD$720 million per month at the current rates. Mendez called the CNE study ?valuable? for certain positive suggestions it provides for the process of reform and capitalization of the electric sector. Mendez, as quoted by El Caribe, said that the people will have ?to get used to paying for expensive electricity because the times of cheap electricity are past.?
President Hipolito Mejia paid the generators US$26 million yesterday, calling himself ?shameless? for paying money he alleges is not owed. ?I shouldn?t be paying,? he said, but pay he did, and Cogentrix, Smith-Enron and Itabo all got part of the check. AES-Dominicana, the parent company of AES-Andres, did not receive any money, ?because,? in the President?s words, ?we paid them all the money in the world and they did not fulfill their obligations.? Mejia said he hoped the payment to the generators would assuage the problems of the unrelenting blackouts.