Hoy newspaper’s “Que se dice” page two column speculates that there are only two explanations for the President’s recent speech about Haiti and the Dominican Republic during the opening of the International Forum on Ethics, Prevention and Penalizing of Corruption. The column says that one of the possibilities, is that the statesman, who could be considered the best informed man in the country, knows something that the rest of the citizens are unaware of, possibly the existence of some dark threat to the DR’s future as a nation. The other possibility is that the President is seeking to emphasize that the government is willing to defend its sovereignty and is distancing itself from the agreement signed by former President Hipolito Mejia with the United States whereby “the national dignity would be stained.” He was apparently referring to the agreement whereby the DR relinquishes allowing the International Court of Criminal Justice to judge US personnel on Dominican territory.
Listin Diario political columnist Orlando Gil speculates along the same lines. He also comments on the President’s recent speech, “What does the President know that the country doesn’t? No one in politics takes up such an outspoken position overnight, he comments. “If he used this scenario to respond to Foreign Policy it is because he feels they are cornering the country, and he is reacting to prevent the DR from becoming a victim of this absurdity. He is aware that nothing is written or published innocently, and his intention with the warning is not just an expression of leadership but also an effort to preempt possible events. His message is not aimed at his audience in the DR, but at the powers that promote the misfortune of another.”
Orlando Gil points out that Foreign Policy is a publication that does not reach out to the public at large, but rather to intellectual and academic circles, breeding grounds for theses, theories and hypotheses that often provide inspiration for some of the most extreme US foreign policy decisions. Foreign Policy recently listed the DR as a failing state, in the same category as its neighbor Haiti.