President Luis Abinader announced the construction of the Santo Domingo Convention Center at the site of the Hotel Hispaniola. The hotel is located on a large property bordered by the Independencia, Abraham Lincoln and Correa y Cidrón avenues. On the south side of the Hispaniola is the closed property of the Hotel Santo Domingo. A Santo Domingo Metro stop is located on the north side of the property.
President Luis Abinader had announced the construction during his participation in the Fitur International Tourism Fair (Fitur) in January of 2022.
The Consorcio Institución Ferial de Madrid (Ifema), the operator of the Fitur fair, would be the builder. Ifema, which organized Fitur and other fairs and conventions in Madrid, was contracted through the Banreservas group, with the advice of Mitur, to do the architectural design and feasibility study.
The Dominican government in the past had been in conversations with the German ITB travel fair consortium.
With Decree 296-22, the Presidency declares “of public utility and social interest the acquisition by the Dominican state of the portions of land where the Hispaniola Hotel is located to be used for the construction of the Santo Domingo Convention Center.”
The executive act establishes that the 30 lots be purchased with funds coming from the Ministry of Tourism (Mitur) and declared of urgency that the Dominican state enter into possession of the property so that the construction of the Santo Domingo Convention Center can begin immediately.
The president of the Association of Hotels of Santo Domingo (AHSD), Yadit García told Hoy newspaper that the convention center would include a hall with capacity for meetings of 5,000 people.
The decree establishes that the 30 lots will be purchased from their owner, the company Palmeras Comerciales, S.A., or expropriated by the Bienes Nacional government entity in case an amicable agreement is not reached. Palmeras Comerciales is a company the media has tied to former Minister of Public Works Miguel Vargas Maldonado during the Hipolito Mejia government, as reported in Diario Dominicano, citing a report in Clave Digital. Vargas Maldonado was minister of foreign relations during the Medina administration. The property reportedly was acquired in a controversial transaction of a purchase of protected area property in Samana and the exchange for the purchase of the government-owned hotel in 2001.
Read more in Spanish:
N Digital
Noticias SIN
Hoy
Diario Dominicano
6 July 2022