FEBRUARY 2009

Indotel inaugurates 22 qualification centers in Santiago

More than three million Dominicans use Internet

BREAKING NEWS: SANTIAGO. - The Dominican Institute of Telecommunications (INDOTEL) delivered 22 Centers of Qualification in Data processing (CCI) at institutions which will assume the direction, management, control and sustainability.

A note provided by the Under direction of Information, Press and Publicity of the Presidency in Santiago, explains that INDOTEL will deliver more than 500 CCI at various institutions, this province having been selected to be the first to benefit from the Data-processing Centers.

The central speech of the inaugural ceremony was made by the State Secretary and President of INDOTEL, Doctor José Rafael Vargas, who ensured that in Dominican Republic, more than three million inhabitants used Internet, the virtual libraries and the computers in general.

Questioned on the denunciation of material stealing in some Centers of Qualification (CCI), the President of INDOTEL, ensured that on 800 Centers, only 3 had been victim of theft.

In this way, the civil servant explained that the majority of the centers have the aptitudes to manage and to maintain the sustainability of their operations, like here in Santiago with institutions well credited in their Community and who are responsible for these centers and their success, he indicated.

Santiago Live, 03.02.09

Tavera Dam releases water and Rafey is evacuated

Red alert for Santiago

BREAKING NEWS : With the Center of Emergency Operations (COE) declaring a red alert for Santiago and five persons dead in Puerto Plata, the authorities are releasing water from the Tavera Dam Reservoir, and evacuating 1500 families from the most vulnerable areas of the city in case the Yaque River overflows.

The regional director of Civil Defense, Francisco Arias, reported that the release of water began with 200 cubic meters per second, but could change according to the amount of rainfall.

The decision was taken by the COE, the Meteorological Office and the Committee for the Tavera Reservoir when the water level at the dam was at 95 centimeters below maximum.

Previous to the release of water, volunteers from Civil Defense talked to neighbors of Bella Vista, along the riverbanks of the Yaque River, in order to avoid unnecessary worries due to the rising waters.

General Luis Luna Paulino toured the vulnerable areas around Rafey and then went to Montecristi where preventive measures were also being taken, in view of the fact that it takes from 11 to 13 hours for the rising waters to reach the Northwest province.

The province most affected by the recent rains has been Puerto Plata, where as of now there have been five victims and more than ten communities cut off.

Diario Libre, 09.02.09

Twelve thousand evacuated

Communities cut off

BREAKING NEWS : About 12,400 persons have been evacuated, 2,480 houses affected, ten communities cut off, five bridges and five highways with damage is, as of now, the results left by the rains that poured down for the past six days, affecting the Cibao and causing five deaths.

The Center of Emergency Operations (COE) reported that the most affected zones are the provinces of Santiago, Puerto Plata and Sanchez Ramirez where cautionary evacuations have been carried out due to the high waters in rivers and creeks.

Colonel Juan Mendez Garcia explained that the rains will continue and therefore the red alert is maintained in Montecristi, Valverde, Santiago, Duarte, Puerto Plata, Monsignor Nouel, and Espaillat. Meanwhile there is a yellow alert in place for Hermanas Mirabal, Samana, Maria Trinidad Sanchez, Sanchez Ramirez, La Vega, Hato Mayor and Santiago Rodriguez. Dajabon, El Seibo and La Altagracia are still on a green alert.

The reports indicate that the communities of Contreras, Juan Rodriguez in San Francisco de Macoris, Hernando Alonzo in Fantino, are cut off from the rest of the country. The town of Amina in Valverde, the communities of Los Castillos and Arroyo Grande in El Seibo as well as Cinta Negra, El Higuera and Vuelta Larga in Nagua are isolated by the flood waters.

The bridges affected are those at Boca de Licey, La Javilla in Tamboril, La Cuchilla in El Seibo and the bridge at Jamao that communicates Puerto Plata with Moca. In Tamboril three persons were injured and four were rescued from the flood waters.

Six thousand families were reported to have been significantly affected throughout the Cibao and the North and Northeast due to flooding caused by the incessant rains.

Reports from correspondents located along the Northwest Line indicate that there is damage to housing, roads and farms.

In Villa Vasquez, Castañuelas, Guayubin and Palo Verde (Montecristi), hundreds of acres of rice, plantains, melons and tomatoes are flooded by the Yaque River and others, after six days of rain.

In San Francisco de Macoris, meanwhile, dozens of families located in Los Amarantes and Los Peinados had to be evacuated.

In Tamboril, brigades from Public Works, Civil Defense, and the municipality worked getting rid of trash and mud left by the flooding of the Licey River.

Hundreds of families found themselves with all of their house furnishings damaged, as well as some businesses, as the center of town was flooded.

In the Carlos Diaz section of Tamboril there are dozens of houses in danger of collapsing due to landslides of terrain that have suffered these slides over the last several years. Recently, landslide activity has become more pronounced. Things have gone so far as to cause the suspension of classes in the school until things are stabilized, since the installation does not offer any kind of security for teachers or students. The Mayor of Canca la Piedra, Alejandro Lopez, requested that the government end a commission from Public Works to evaluate the zone.

President Leonel Fernandez ordered the aid and disaster assistance organizations to take control in the communities affected by the rains in the Cibao region, and he declared a state of national emergency the purchase and contracting of goods and services in order to assist as soon as possible for the thousands of displaced families and fix the damage caused in roads, bridges and farms.

The Chief Executive issued decree number 92-09 that freed the ministries of Agriculture, Public Works, National Institute of Hydraulic Resources (INDRHI), Presidential Social Plan, Essential Medicines Program (Promese), Economic Kitchens and the National Housing Institute (INVI) from compliance with procedures established in Law 340-06 and its modifications.

The Minister for the Presidency, Cesar Pina Toribio, said during a press conference that the President is receiving all of the evaluations regarding the displaced families in the Cibao region and that in the next few hours he will travel to the affected provinces. He was clear on the fact that the dispositions contained in the decree are good for just 30 days.

Diario Libre, 10.02.09

Fernandez to see affected areas of Cibao today

To evaluate the damage caused by the rains

BREAKING NEWS: President Leonel Fernandez will begin a tour today of the town of Tamboril, in Santiago province, and other areas affected by the heavy and constant rains that have fallen during the recent days causing five deaths, landslides and huge agricultural losses.

The Presidential Press Office reported last night that the Chief Executive would leave for Tamboril at 1:00 p.m., accompanied by several officials in order to evaluate the damage caused by the rains in the Cibao.

Fernandez ordered that the assistance organizations take control of the communities that were affected. He also issued Decree 92-09 which facilitated purchase of goods and services under a national emergency proviso that will allow for rapid assistance to reach displaced persons and repair damage to roads and bridges and farms.

The decree freed up the ministries of Agriculture, Public Works, Hydraulic Resources, Social Plan, Promese (medicines), Economic Kitchens, and the National Housing Institute (INVI), from fulfilling the bureaucratic red tape established in Law 340-06 and modifications regarding Purchases and Contracting of Goods, Services and Works. The decree will be in effect for 30 days.

Among the communities most affected, besides Tamboril, are Carlos Diaz-where dozens of buildings were buried by landslides-, Licey al Medio, Gaspar Hernandez, Puerto Plata, Sabaneta, La Vega, Tenares, Imbert, San Francisco de Macoris, Nagua, Cotui, and Monsignor Nouel.

Landslides that for several days have occurred in the Carlos Diaz section of Tamboril, buried yesterday morning dozens of houses, the high school and a church, but there were no injuries.

The families that were affected, a total of some 300 persons, were housed in the multi-use facility in the community of Calientisimo, where two mobile hospitals were set up to offer consultations and vaccinate the refugees. Meanwhile the provincial governor handed out food rations, mattresses, sheets and blankets.

At the same time, brigades of aid workers are on alert and warning people that are still in the landslide zone to be aware of possible evacuations.

Engineer Gerard Beltran, from Public Works, reported that a team of geologists will inspect the area to determine the measures that will have to be taken in the future.

Consulted by Diario Libre, professor of engineering and geology at the PUCMM Orlando Franco explained that these landslides are caused by a geological fault in the Northern Mountains and the configuration of the terrain where there is a lot of gravity and unevenness.

The COE reported yesterday that 13,800 person have been displaced as a result of the intense rains, while 2,760 houses have been affected, with 71 of them destroyed completely.

At the same time, 36 communities were isolated because the rains caused damage to 8 bridges and six highways. Twenty four of the cut off areas are in the Maria Trinidad Sanchez province due to the flooding of the rivers Papayo, Boba, La Palmita, Guazaro and Yagua.

There are still seven provinces under a red alert

The National Emergency Center is keeping the red alert in place for Montecristi, Valverde, Santiago, Duarte, Puerto Plata, Monsignor Nouel, and Espaillat, There is a yellow alert in place for San Pedro de Macoris, Hermanas Mirabal, Samana, Maria Trinidad Sanchez, La Altagracia, El Seibo, Sanchez Ramirez, La Vega, Hato Mayor and Santiago Rodriguez. Dajabon is under a green alert. The rains, according to the National Meteorological Office, will start to diminish this afternoon.

Diario Libre, 11.02.09

Rains bring havoc to Cibao

President Fernandez will fly to the area today to inspect the damage. Yesterday the bad weather kept his aircraft grounded

BREAKING NEWS: The authorities from Public Health initiated a vaccination campaign among the evacuated persons in the Calientisimo section of Tamboril where there are 530 persons that on Tuesday morning lost their homes to landslides in the Carlos Diaz section of the municipality.

Doctor Ramon Martinez, the provincial health director, said that the refugees received vaccinations against several illnesses as a preventive measure against an outbreak.

He reported that moreover, the permanent medical team is offering general consults as well as gynecological, pediatric and psychological consultations. Meanwhile the Presidential Social Plan is offering food rations to the displaced persons.

For his part, the regional director of education, Clement de la Cruz, said that the nearly 200 students of the high school that was buried in the landslide would be relocated in different schools in Canca la Piedra and other neighboring communities.

At the same time, police authorities reported that several persons were arrested as they were discovered in the area of the slides picking up belongings of the persons affected by the disaster.

The presidential visit scheduled for yesterday to the affected zone will be carried out today. President Leonel Fernandez will fly to the area at 9:00 o’clock this morning, landing in Tamboril, and from there he will go to other areas including the Lower Yuna Basin.

Thousands of acres of farms producing tomatoes, rice, bananas, plantains, and other staples located in Castanuelas, Palo Verde and Montecristi were affected by the flood waters, and were still under water yesterday as a result of the floods from the Yaque river.Nine days of steady rains produced the flood conditions.

Regarding the infrastructure of the road system, the Vice-Minister of Public Works for the North Region, Porfirio Brito, said that the most affected section were the road from Navarrete to Puerto Plata, the tourist Highway from Puerto Plata to Santiago and the rural roads in Santiago, Moca and La Vega.

The National Emergency Center (COE) reported yesterday afternoon that a total of 15, 055 persons had been evacuated and most of these were in homes of family members.

A total of 3,011 houses were affected and 64 communities were isolated by flood waters or damaged roads or bridges.

The COE also reported that it ordered the release of water from the Valdesia Dam due to the rains in the High Watershed of the Nizao River.

Diario Libre, 12.02.09

Inauguration of a new Attention Center to the Victims of Domestic Violence

The Country Attorney said he will do everything is possible to prevent women deaths

BREAKING NEWS:The Country Attorney, Radhamés Jiménez Peña, ensured in Santiago, while he was inaugurating a new Attention Center to the Victims of Domestic Violence, Intra Familiar and Sexual Abuse, that he would invest all the necessary resources to increase the programs that will enable to reduce the number of women killed by their husbands, a situation he qualified as worrying.

Radhamés Jiménez Peña said he hoped the office that was inaugurated in this city, with an investment of 7 354 000 pesos, will help the couples to resolve the conflicts in their lives without using violence.

It’s worrying to see how every day, men kill their wives, this is why we have to make efforts in order to prevent this situation, he added.

He explained to that he gave instructions for the personal to organize work groups and educative debates in order to direct the citizens towards an harmonic life without violence.

The new offices were inaugurated during a ceremony directed by Jimenez Peña, Roxanna Reyes, Vielka Calderón, and Raúl Martínez.

The Center to the Victims of Domestic Violence of Santiago is located next to the Justice Palace, and offers the victim a legal assistance, sociology and prevention, between 08.00 am and 04.30 pm.

Santiago Live, 16.02.09

Closing of Summit first phase in Santiago

National Unity to Face the World Economic Crisis

BREAKING NEWS: SANTIAGO. - President Leonel Fernández will direct this Thursday the Summit on the National Unity first the phase and will receive the proposals granted by the seven work tables of the meeting.

The Minister of Economy, Temistocles Montas, coordinator of the event, said that the activity would take place at 05:00 p.m. at the Catholic Madre y Maestra University of Santiago.

In addition to the President, Temistocles Montas and Agripino Núñez, chairman of the Economic Social and Institutional Council, (CESI) will also intervene.

One will explain the process of the second phase of the Summit, after that, on February 27; the President would announce the proposals which will be carried out this year.

It is expected that the second phase of the Summit will be terminated in May with an agreement for a National Strategy of Development, which will be subjected in June to the National Congress.

Some 600 representatives of political, employers’s trade-union, community, religious, provincial, municipal, academic and non-profit organizations as well as representatives of the State institutions took part in the work’s days of the Summit.

A total of 960 proposals were examined by the work tables, the majority were accepted by the government and their execution will require a public investment among 18 and 26 billion pesos.

Santiago Live, 18.02.09

LF creates commission to follow up on Summit

A commission was created to monitor the results of the discussions

BREAKING NEWS :  After receiving the agreed upon proposals from the different work groups, President Leonel Fernandez said that the results of the « Summit for national unity to face the world crisis » the Dominican Republic anticipates, planning and making decisions that will take into account all of the sectors of society.

He said that in the current situation it is not enough to have a clear government plan, a defined political will, be efficient and transparent" , rather " it requires, moreover, the incorporation and the integration of the whole society in the execution of these public policies that have been the result of debates, reflections and with the participation of technicians.

In this vein, the President argued that the country is taking a step like a model of representative democracy going towards a model of deliberative democracy, with broad based participation of all the sectors of national life in the problem that is affecting it.

Regarding the results of the summit, the Chief Executive said that a follow up commission was created to monitor the results of the discussions and which, he said, will demand the compliance of the obligations that were taken on in the dialogue in order to see that they get done.

He reassured the assembly that the sources of financing the proposals that can be implemented in the short term will be identified, whether they are resources of the 2009 budget or from external sources.

Standing before government officials and the different representatives of the various sectors that participated in the Summit, brought together in the main campus of the Pontifical Catholic University Madre y Maestra in Santiago, Fernandez said that this follow-up commission will be made up of the coordinators of the Summit and the representatives of the different working groups.

The coordinators of the Summit are Minister of Economy, Planning and Development Temistocles Montas, Monsignor Agripino Nunez Collado, Antonio Isa Conde, and Jose del Castillo.

The work group that dealt with Economy and Competitiveness was coordinated by Lisandro Macarrulla; Citizen Safety by Franklin Almeyda; Social Policy and Jobs by Rafael Alburquerque; Institutional Consolidation by Servio Tulio Castanos; Electricity, Hydrocarbons and Renewable Energies by Franklin Baez Brugal.
Also, the work group that took on Territorial Development, Municipal Management and the Environment was coordinated by Emmanuel Castillo and the one for Migration and Frontier by Pedro Justo Castellanos.

He explained that the commission should organize a list of priorities and set up a work schedule that will allow them to go forward.

President Fernandez confirmed that the Dominican Republic has to have a long term vision that will permit it to strengthen itself in the international markets with a greater level of potentiality and development that up to now has not been there and that with the execution of the proposals that were formulated in the summit it will get over the crisis.

A total of 960 proposals were discussed by the seven work groups. Of these, 443 were agreed upon through consensus and given to the President last night.

Most of the proposals came from the group that dealt with Territorial Development, Municipal Management and Environment with 115.

Institutional Consolidation contributed 89 proposals; Economy and Competitiveness 88; Migration and Frontier 44; Citizen Safety 42; Electricity, Hydrocarbons and Renewable Energies 33; and Social Policy and Jobs, 32.

At the end of the third work session of this first phase of the Summit, last Friday, Temistocles Montas declared that the execution of these proposals will imply an investment of between RD $18.0 billion and RD $26.0 billion.

During his part in the activity last evening, Montas reported that the second phase of the Summit would begin on 27 February and it will deal with the proposals that require a 10 to 15 year timeframe.

Diario Libre, 20.02.09

Dominican Grand Carnival Gala

To be held in Santiago

BREAKING NEWS : Santiago.– The main hall of Gran Teatro del Cibao will be the stage for the traditional Gran Gala de Carnaval, on Sunday 8 March at 6 pm, which marks the end to carnival activities in Santiago de los Caballeros.

According to Victor Erarte, in charge of the Gran Gala de Carnaval production, this year´s event promises to be an extravaganza of creativity and magic. This is a show for all the family, as special choreography has been prepared for young participants he added.

Dominican Today, 23.02.09

The Cibao International Airport will be restored

An investment of several million pesos

BREAKING NEWS: LICEY AL MEDIO, SANTIAGO. - The engineer Víctor Suárez general administrator of the Cibao International Airport, announced that the terminal will be subjected to a process of restoration and extension in various sectors of its structures, to optimize the service to the passengers.

The civil servant explained that the investments will be transformed into work in the security, the car parks and the access to the airport sectors as well as in the housing units of the soldiers. The zone will be also drained and the pavement will be remade.

He indicated that this work of readjustment is an investment of several million pesos We will carry out this work in order to offer to the airport users and visitors the greatest comfort and facilitated possible.

He informed that last year, the International Airport of Cibao invested more than 100 million pesos in work to adapt this terminal and its accesses.

He declared that For the administration of the Cibao International Airport, it is fundamental that our visitors and passengers enjoy the comfort which they deserve.

He also ratified that We will continue to invest as it was our standard since we began the operations .

Santiago Live, 24.02.09

Ceremonies to celebrate the Independence Day

Processions and music

BREAKING NEWS: Santiago. - With various official ceremonies, one will celebrate on Friday February 27 the 165^th anniversary of the National independence.

Nelsa Chávez, under-secretary of Education, while speaking on behalf of the provincial governor, announced the ceremonies which will take place on Friday in the city.

At 8:00 a.m., interpretation of the National anthem and flag raising with the military honors in front of the seat of the provincial government, in the Calle del Sol.

Then, at 8:30, a Tedeum will be celebrated by the archbishop of Santiago, monsignor Ramón Benito de la Rosa y Carpio, at the cathedral Santiago Apóstol and a speech referring to the date of the fatherland independence will be pronounced by the civil servant of the secretariat of Education.

Then, there will be a school procession with the participation of hundreds of students of public and private schools, and with that of the municipal and of National army brass bands, procession which will leave the Duarte park, will cross the Calle del Sol for then going to Juan Pablo Duarte avenue and to arrive at the statue of the patriot in front of the local Town hall.

Later in this place, floral offering will be deposited by various public and private institutions. There will be a short speech of the mayor of Santiago and of the provincial governor.

Then, when the night will come, the « Viva Patria » concert will start, gathering several popular artists and orchestras, in the Monumental sector, event completely free for the public.

Santiago Live, 26.02.09