The general manager of the Dominican Refinery (REFIDOMSA), Alfredo Nara, has told reporters that the refinery is currently in a state of non-liquidity due to the accumulated debt of RD$500 million owed by the Dominican government for propane gas. This money represents the government’s subsidy for propane gas that is used for transportation and domestic use. The general manager asked that the president of the refinery, Aristides Fernandez Zucco, authorize a check for RD$126 million. In response, Fernandez Zucco asked Nara to send him the calculations on the costs for the Dominican Republic that the dividends held by Shell are accumulating. As revealed in El Caribe, the internal conflicts came to the light of day when Nara showed reporters a series of notes between himself and Fernandez Zucco. The notes show a heated exchange of opinions between the two men. In the first memo, Nara asks Fernandez Zucco to authorize a check for RD$126 million to pay the government’s part of the propane subsidy, and points out that each day’s delay would cost the refinery RD$40,000. Fernandez Zucco answered two days later with an “urgent” request for the calculations as to the cost for the government of the Shell’s retention of the dividends over the past several years that Fernandez said were in the hundreds of millions of pesos. Fernandez also asked for the amount that the Shell Company owed for non-payment of the exchange commission tax as well as other taxes.
Apparently there are still serious differences about the issue of petroleum that comes from Venezuela under the Petro-Caribe Agreement. Nara told reporters that the refinery’s board of directors held heated discussions about the arrival of the first shipment of oil under the agreement. According to the Shell Company, the oil was not up to specifications and needed to be returned. However, at the insistence of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, the oil was eventually accepted, on the grounds that a rejection of the first shipment would cause a rupture in the entire agreement.