The President of the Chamber of Deputies, Rafaela Alburquerque, said that the National Budget for RD$83 billion will be reviewed as soon as the deputies return to work. She said the deputies? work sessions are closed until 27 February. However, the legislature ends on 12 January. As reported in El Caribe, the legal advisor to the President, Guido Gomez Mazara, said he was confident that the deputies would return to work much earlier.
The government begins the year with the implementation of the 2002 budget for RD$73 billion. If Congress does not approve the new loan, the law authorizes the Presidency to use surplus revenues estimated at RD$2 billion at its discretion, as Hoy newspaper comments in an editorial in its Friday, 3 January issue.
