Listin Diario writes that the late President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela made his first official visit to the Dominican Republic in April 1999 to attend the Summit for the Heads of State and Government from the Association of Caribbean States. The Dominican President at the time was Leonel Fernandez. The visit set the base for a stronger friendship between Venezuela and the Dominican Republic that would include other Presidents of the Dominican Republic, namely Hipolito Mejia, Joaquin Balaguer Ricardo and Juan Bosch.
Chavez made several official visits to the country during the governments of Hipolito Mejia and Leonel Fernandez. He congratulated Danilo Medina effusively when he won the Presidency, saying that his victory would maintain the hope for a dignified and sovereign future for the whole region.
During his time as President, Chavez consolidated the fraternal relationship between the two countries, often recalling that the founding father of the Dominican Republic, Juan Pablo Duarte had spent his later years and a great part of his life in “the great land of Simon Bolivar”.
In March 2001, he visited the DR together with his wife, Maria Isabel Rodriguez de Chavez and was welcomed at the Presidential Palace by then President Hipolito Mejia Dominguez and his wife, First Lady Rosa Gomez de Mejia. On that occasion the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo awarded him an Honorary Doctorate.
He was an admirer of Dominican figures like the National Poet Pedro Mir, and the leader of the April 1965 Revolution, Francisco Alberto Caamano. During that same year, Chavez was honored with the Order of Duarte, Sanchez and Mella. His links with the Dominican Republic, with some highs and lows, were always characterized by solidarity.
In his last visit, in 2010, Chavez announced an agreement to install four refineries in the country for distributing fuel to the whole Caribbean region. At the same time, he agreed to renew the energy program known as the San Jose agreement.
His first three visits to the country took place during the government of Leonel Fernandez, with whom he established a strong friendship, and then with Hipolito Mejia (2000-2004). The relationship cooled a little due to Mejia’s links with Carlos Andres Perez, former President of Venezuela, who lived in exile in the Dominican Republic until he moved to Miami when Venezuela threatened to cut oil deliveries to the DR.
There were some tense moments during the Mejia government when Chavez complained that some members of the Dominican military were involved in a plot to overthrow him, which caused a cooling in bilateral relations, and affected oil dispatches to the Dominican Republic.
Later, during the subsequent Fernandez government, Chavez said that a deep and strategic alliance needed to be created across all institutions in both countries. Leonel Fernandez also compared Chavez to the leader of the April 1965 Revolution in the Dominican Republic, Colonel Francisco Alberto Caamano.
www.listindiario.com/la-republica/2013/3/6/268310/Presidente-Hugo-Chavez-fue-un-gran-amigo-de-los-dominicanos