National Investigations Department (DNI) director Sigfrido Pared Perez has dismissed rumors that the total blackout the country experienced on Saturday, 16 May 2015 was caused by sabotage.
He said that the DNI was waiting for a technical report to establish the cause of the explosion that plunged most of the country into darkness for more than six hours before making any announcement.
When asked about an alleged assassination attempt against President Danilo Medina, a rumor that has been circulating in some media, he dismissed it as false. Meanwhile, Presidency spokesman Roberto Rodriguez Marchena called a press conference yesterday, Monday 18 May 2015 to state that the rumor that the President had been poisoned was false.
Interviewed on the El Equipo radio show on 92.5FM yesterday, Tomas Castro, the lawyer who reported the alleged attempt, which he said had been unsuccessful, said that he trusted the source that had shared the news.
Speaking about the blackout, Rodriguez Marchena said that the blackout was caused by an isolating switch that released and made contact with a 138-kilowatt bar at a power plant in Haina. CDEEE executive vice president Ruben Jimenez Bichara had attributed the failure to maintenance issues at an Itabo power plant, which the generation company described as “unlikely.”
http://www.listindiario.com/la-republica/2015/5/18/367590/DNI-descarta-que-apagon-general-fuera-un-sabotaje
http://www.diariolibre.com/noticias/2015/05/18/i1153671_gobierno-desmiente-rumores-envenenamiento-contra-presidente-medina.html
http://presidencia.gob.do/noticias/portavoz-informa-suministro-electrico-es-de-86-niega-intento-envenenamiento