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Nuria Piera has done it again, unearthing another extreme case of Dominican government corruption. On her Saturday Color Vision Channel 9 investigative journalism show, she presented the case of the director of the Land Transport Office (OTTT) Franklin Beltre who confirmed nepotism in his department. There are 19 employees with his two last names Beltre and Cabral on the OTTT payroll. Many of them are from his hometown, Guayabal, in Padre de las Casas.
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According to El Caribe, Beltre admitted he has no real clue as to how many people work in his department and accepted that members of his family are working there. The report says that the OTTT employs 635 workers and spends an estimated RD$7.8 million per month (RD$94 million per year). But Beltre says the official payroll doesn’t include an extra 200 unaccounted people. I don’t know exactly how many people are employed by OTTT, [...]

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Deputy Minister of Environment Eleuterio Martinez said that even if the Chamber of Deputies approves a bill legalizing the sale of areas within the National Park of the East, the Ministry would not authorize any construction within the park. Earlier, the Ministry’s director of protected areas, Manuel Mateo Feliz warned about plans to exclude areas that are part of the National Park for tourism projects and would not benefit the community of Boca de Yuma, as the legislators argue.
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The controversial bill has the support of the following deputies:
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PRSC: Sergio Antonio Cedeno De Jesus, Ramon Ricardo Sanchez De la Rosa, Guido Cabrera Martinez, Carlos Jose Ramon Martinez Arango, Victor Orlando Bisono Haza, Radhames Castro, Roberto Ernesto Feliz Feliz, Carmen Mirelys Uceta Velez, Remberto Arturo Cruz Rodriguez, Cesar Enrique Gomez Segura.
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PRD: Eugenio Cedeno Areche, Bernardo Sanchez Rosario, Luis Ernesto Camilo Garcia, Aquiles Leonel Ledesma Alcantara, Victor [...]

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Last week DR1 erroneously reported that the former president of the board of Banco de Progreso had been sentenced to pay RD$12.2 million in compensation to the Grupo Progreso and the Banco Dominicano del Progreso. The report should have read RD$12.2 billion.

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Interior and Police Minster Franklin Almeyda Rancier admits that there are too many generals in the DR and said that more should be retired. Almeyda says that instead of more generals there should be more street level cops patrolling the streets of Santo Domingo. Quoted in Listin Diario Almeyda said, the least amount of generals, the better. We still have too many. There are something like 57. We have to keep removing some.

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The Armed Forces has dishonorably discharged Sergeant Angel Sena Perez after the sergeant punched a priest during an argument in February. According to media reports, Sena owns a disco-light party bus in Neyba and on the night in question priest Michel Vargas voiced concern about the noise coming from the mobile disco. Sena responded by punching the priest and throwing a chair at him. The Ministry of Environment closed down the disco-light and Sena will now be tried in a civil court.

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The promoters of the first line of the Santo Domingo Metro originally predicted 175,000 users per day, but reality has shown the demand to be about half that number. Hoy reports that average demand is 67,678 travelers, as was the average daily use from 30 January to 26 February. Hoy says that the government is spending US$25 million a year to subsidize the operation of the first line of the metro.
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In his 27 February state of the nation address, President Leonel Fernandez announced that he was assigning priority to the construction of the second line of the metro and to the construction of the Haina-Santiago passenger-cargo train.

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Former Central Bank governor Bernardo Vega is wary of the government’s announcements of new large-scale public works projects. Vega said that instead the government should embark on projects that use a large workforce. He said these so-called mega-projects usually use imported heavy machinery, as reported in El Caribe. He said that what the government should be doing is investing in building homes, rural roads and repairing irrigation canals. The former ambassador in Washington, D.C. said the Dominican government should take pointers from the Costa Rican government and its global crisis programs. When interviewed by Orlando Jorge Mera on his weekly program Lideres, he criticized the fact that the government is becoming larger with the purchase of the Shell-held stock in the Dominican Petroleum Refinery, the construction of the second line of the metro and a train to Santiago and the power distribution companies. Vega said that this just adds to [...]

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The Ministry of Industry and Commerce has issued resolution 25-09 (Article 7), requiring authorized natural gas conversion workshops to issue warranties on the systems they install. The warranties will be for 25,000 kilometers and will require technicians to perform a check-up and keep a log of every check- up of the gas conversion systems. The aim is to keep records of all systems installed so that the information can be used for statistical purposes. The resolution also requires the technicians to have a contract with gas conversion kit importers to ensure improved communications between the installers and the producers of the kits. Other measures included in the resolution are for conversion garages to cover a minimum area of 250 square meters and include an area for checking vehicles. Installers may also not install the systems on car roofs or within a vehicle, except the tank, and all systems must include [...]

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According to Hacienda Minister Vicente Bengoa, the DR and Central America have yet to feel the pressures of the world economic crisis, saying that what is being seen is a deceleration of growth in the region’s economies. Bengoa explained that a recession is defined by two consecutive semesters of negative growth, while what is being seen in the region is a period of slower growth. Bengoa predicts that economic growth will be an estimated 3% in 2009 after having registered 8.5% in the last four years.

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The Santo Domingo AgroAlimentaria Fair held at the Dominican Fiesta Hotel last week exceeded the organizers’ expectations. The effective coordination work carried out by the Agribusiness Board (JAD) with the backing of the Center for Exports and Investments (CEI-RD) working through Dominican Embassies abroad and foreign embassies in the Dominican Republic succeeded in attracting several key buyers for Dominican farm produce. During the four-day fair, local producers were able to place major shipments of organic bananas, avocados, mangos and pineapples. Osmar Benitez, executive vice president of the JAD, said that the fair linked Dominican produce to a Japanese supermarket chain with 3,500 stores in Japan. He said US$200 million a year in additional farm produce sales were transacted in the eent where there were over 450 pre-scheduled business appointments. Buyers came from Antigua Barbuda, St. Maarten, Colombia, Curacao, Uruguay, Chile, Japan, the United States (NY and Miami).
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A [...]

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