1998 – Page 61

Most primary and secondary schools open on Tuesday, 1 September. The Ministry of Education announced that around 132,000 new students have enrolled in government-run grade school and high schools throughout the country. This brings the number of students studying in public schools to 1,877,344, or almost 25% of the nation’s population. The public school system …

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President Leonel Fernández converted into law the bill that punishes organizers of illegal boat trips with three to 10 years in jail and fines of RD$10,000 to RD$50,000. The new Law is number 344-98. The President also converted into law the bill that exempts personal computers from the payment of value-added taxes (ITBIS). The spare …

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President Ernesto Zedillo of Mexico will visit this year. The engineer in charge of the government office that supervises public works, Rafael Serrulle told the local press that the government is spending RD$6 million to restore the monument that honors Father Antón de Montesinos, renown as the first human rights activist in the Americas. The …

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The Corporación Dominicana de Electricidad, the state electricity utility, has said said that since all private and state units are satisfactorily operating, there is a joint production of 1,415 megawatts. He said this is sufficient to reduce blackouts to a minimum. Peak hour demand is 1,350 megawatts.

The Dominican press has been covering the plight of new mayor of Santo Domingo, Johnny Ventura, who regardless of the real problems he has as he sets about modernizing the Santo Domingo municipality, has to deal with the pressures of job-seekers from his own political party. TV newscasts have showed overeager PRD members at the …

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Lawyer Rafael Suberví Bonilla, former two-time Mayor of Santo Domingo and former Minister of Tourism, and today deputy for the province of Barahona, formally announced his decision to seek the PRD presidential candidacy for the year 2000 presidential elections in a campaign event at the Club San Carlos on Sunday at 10 am. He is …

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Former president of the Junta Central Electoral, Dr. César Estrella Sahdalá, who gained national and international respect after organizing the first undisputed Dominican presidential elections in 1996, added his two cents to the political confrontations that are affecting national institutions. He suggested that all elected boards of institutions under controversy resign. These are the Central …

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A former president of the Colegio de Abogados, the board of lawyers in the DR, said that the new members of the Chamber of Accounts presided by Dr. Hugo Arias Fabián were illegally elected as their term expired on 16 August 1998. Fernando Hernández Díaz argued that the Constitution establishes that these be elected on …

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Ninety-one year old Ambassador Minerva Bernardino, the first woman in the world to be an ambassador before the United Nations, died on Friday, 28 August at 91. Mrs. Bernardino was the only survivor of the Dominican mission that traveled to San Francisco, California to sign the founding charter of the United Nations in 1945. She …

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The DR-US$ exchange rate continued stable with banks buying at RD$15 to RD$15.20. Street market vendors were offering RD$15.25-RD$15.35 for the US dollar. Dollars were being sold in commercial banks and exchange houses for RD$15.20-RD$15.45. In the informal market, dollars were going for RD$15.45-RD$15.50.