Engineer Freddy Perez has ousted his deputy minister, architect Polibio Michel Presbot (Kalil) from his offices at the department, and his staff was also dismissed. Perez has posted soldiers at the entrance of the latter’s office. Diario Libre speculates that the conflict arose after the detection of supposed irregularities in the completion of the Supreme Court of Justice and the Universidad Autonoma de Santo Domingo library. But Perez is not saying much on the subject. His only response to the press: “I served in the 1996-2000 government, and was able to carry out my work with transparency. There is nothing in my past that indicates that I did not fulfill my work responsibilities,” he said.
Hoy newspaper cites sources that state that at the core of the conflict is a RD$500+ million difference regarding the final completion cost of the Supreme Court building, which was originally budgeted at RD$400 million.