Greens challenge Dominican Republic leader on corruption

Santo Domingo.- The Green March grassroots movement on Thurs. challenged president Danilo Medina to provide precise answers oon his ties with the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht in his rendering of account on 27 February.

The group criticized that, more than a year after the corruption plot between the Dominican State and the company was made public, the chief executive continues his silence as citizens continuously complain in the streets.

“The citizenship has fulfilled its duty and in a civic and forceful manner has demanded in the streets and various public instances that the law prevails, that the corrupt be punished, the stolen money be recovered and the regime of impunity ceased,” the Greens said in a press release.

They said Medina’s constitutional duty to the citizens is to protect State assets, as well as to comply with and enforce the law.

Green March questions to President Medina:

1. Why, if the Purchasing and Contracting Law (340-06) of the Dominican Republic prohibits state institutions from signing or maintaining contracts with companies whose owners are convicted of criminal practices, you and your government maintain contracts with the multinational mafia, Odebrecht?
2. Taking into account that the Constitution clearly indicates in its article 169 that the Prosecutor’s Office is the State body responsible for the prosecution of the crime, under what constitutional foundation you decided to form by decree a commission of people without any legal legitimacy to investigate the allegations of corruption related to the tender process at the Punta Catalina power plant, the most important and publicized energy project of your tenure?
3. Under what conditions did the international criminal Joao Santana work for your Government in the very facilities of the National Palace?
4. Where are the documents that guarantee the Dominican citizens that the work of Joao Santana in his presidential campaigns and in his government wasn’t carried out under the scheme of money laundering that the publicist and Odebrecht executed in other countries of the region for years?
5. What is your response to the statement in which Juan Temístocles Montás, former minister of his Government and member of the PLD (ruling party) Political Committee, claims that he received illegal money from Odebrecht to finance his presidential campaign in the southern region of the country?
6. Where are the payment receipts to the international criminal Joao Santana?
7. Why, being the Head of State, the first of the country’s public servants, the main promoter of projects such as Punta Catalina and the most important commercial partner of Joao Santana in the country, has maintained for more than a year absolute silence in the face of the mobilization and the demand for answers from thousands of citizens throughout the national territory and the diaspora?
8. What is your response to the request that more than 300,000 citizens signed in the days of the Green Paper, demanding the creation of a commission of independent prosecutors to investigate the Odebrecht case?
9. What measures has your Government taken in the last year to investigate and sanction along with the Prosecutor and the Judicial Branch to a political crime that, in the cases of Los Tres Brazos, Tucanos, OISOE, the lands of the CEA or the Metro Santo Domingo, has stolen the funds of Health, Education, Transportation, Food, Housing and other services not provided to the Dominican population?
10. If you are a public servant, who prides himself on a speech of transparency and closeness to people, why do you refuse to answer these and other legitimate questions from the Dominican citizenship and the media that still don’t respond? the mandates of the National Budget?