SANTO DOMINGO.-  Of the RD$51.311 billion requested by the Executive Branch from the National Congress as a supplementary budget, some RD$4.385 billion will go to the Ministry of Industry and Commerce.

Following this is the Ministry of Public Health and Social Assistance with RD$3.066 billion. Then follow the Armed Forces with RD$1.0 billion, the Ministry of Foreign Relations with RD$1.2 billion, and Agriculture with RD$1.034 billion.

Also noteworthy is the National Congress and the Central Electoral Board with RD$300 million each. Of the RD$49.971 billion that go to the Executive Branch, the Presidency will receive RD$8.32 billion and RD$843 million to the Ministry of Higher Education, Science and Technology.

Yesterday the Senate of the Republic sent the legislative proposals for the Supplementary Budget and the Law of Bonds that supports the budget request. The joint commission that will study both proposals will be chaired by the president of the Permanent Budget Commission, Senator Dionis Sanchez and the president of the Senate, Reinaldo Pared Perez will also be a member of the commission.

In the letter sent by President Leonel Fernandez to the Senate it was explained that the modification of the expenditures will be supported, among other options, in a legislative proposal for the Law of Bonds for US$500 million in order to send them to the electric companies that belong to the state and they will use it to pay for the cost of producing electric energy.

Electric subsidy

In the meantime, the vice-president of the Dominican Corporation of State-owned Electricity Enterprises (CDEEE), Celso Marranzini, said yesterday that the US$500 million from the bonds submitted by the Executive Branch to the Congress are not for that entity but rather for the consumers.

He explained that at this moment the US$60 million that they receive each month for subsidies, US$57 million go to direct subsidies of the electric rates due to the effects of the price of fuel oil and diesel.

He recalled that in 2008 for each dollar that the government gave to the electric subsidy, 80 cents went to subsidize the inefficiency of the distributors and 20 cents went to pay the tariff, but today, 75 cents go to the consumer and 25 cents go to the tariff.

He explained that the US$500 million that they are giving will go exclusively to the consumer in order to avoid an increase in the electricity rates. He said that 80% of the Dominicans pay 11.5 cents a kilowatt-hour. Whoever pays more is because he uses more.

For his part, the economist Porfirio Garcia Fernandez said he felt that the Supplementary Budget is a way of mortgaging the State's income and putting to one side the solution of the necessities of the people in order to subsidize the electricity problem.

On the other hand, the sitting magistrate of the Central Electoral Board (JCE), Cesar Feliz Feliz, said that the assignment of RD$300 million include in the supplementary budget is not sufficient enough to pay the debts that resulted from the election process. He did not want to be more precise with numbers, but he said that they have sufficient debts with suppliers of goods and services for the organization of the election of the president and the overseas deputies.

And the rector of the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo (UASD), Mateo Aquino Febrillet, said that it was unfair that they assigned just RD$300 million for that school.