DOMINICAN POLITICS III #8: HIPOLITO MEJIA SUPPORTS

C O N F I D E N T I A L SANTO DOMINGO 003329 SIPDIS SIPDIS STATE FOR WHA, WHA/CAR, INR/IAA; USSOUTHCOM ALSO FOR POLAD; TREASURY FOR OASIA-JLEVINE; DEPT PASS USDA FOR FAS; USDOC FOR 4322/ITA/MAC/WH/CARIBBEAN BASIN DIVISION; USDOC FOR 3134/ITA/USFCS/RD/WH; DHS FOR CIS-CARLOS ITURREGUI E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/20/2016 TAGS: DR PGOV PREL ECON EFIN SUBJECT: DOMINICAN POLITICS III #8: HIPOLITO MEJIA SUPPORTS VARGAS MALDONADO REF: SANTO DOMINGO 3308 Classified By: Deputy Chief of Mission Roland W. Bullen, Reasons 1.4(b) , (d) ¶1. (U) This is the eighth cable in our series on Dominican politics in the third year of the administration of President Leonel Fernandez. (C) During a tour d'horizon of the local political scene, former president Hipolito Mejia (2000-2004) told the Ambassador that his Dominican Revolutionary Party (PRD) needed the managerial skills and vision of Miguel Vargas Maldonado, the front-runner for the 2008 PRD presidential nomination. Mejia sees Vargas as more of a businessman than a politician, someone who can manage a political campaign and a government as if they were corporations. Mejia predicted that 80 percent of PRD members will support Vargas at the January 7 convention. He dismissed as irrelevant as series of muck-raking articles about Vargas's business affairs in the on-line journal Clave Digital -- "that's your friend at work" (apparently referring to businessman-owner Abraham Hazoury). (C) The PRD is undergoing a process of renewal, he said, and Vargas is part of a new generation. Soon senior PRD figures who are rival to Vargas Maldonado "will be in the trashcan." He sniffed at the candidacy of his former vice president, Milagros Ortiz Bosch. PRD Secretary General Orlando Jorge Mera "is a good boy, serious -- but he lacks force." (C) Mejia asserts that the ruling Dominican Liberation Party (PLD) is vulnerable to a "crisis" in February or March of ¶2007. "At this point in my term, I had support of sixty percent." (In the 2004 election he got only 32 percent.) The former President predicted that the unsolved problems in the electricity system, fiscal problems, resumption of debt servicing, excessive increases in government employment and insufficient social spending would be factors. (C) Mejia considers that President Fernandez may face a split within the PLD as chief of staff Danilo Medina moves to consolidate his own presidential ambitions for 2008. Mejia says that Medina has in his pocket two-thirds of the PLD's senators and congressional representatives. He called Medina "dangerous. . . a Mao-style Marxist." (C) In the Baninter fraud case, Mejia said, "The defendants will probably be found guilty but they're negotiating with the prosecutors for a ten-year sentence. . . I think they should go to jail for 20 years." (C) The Reformed Social Christian Party (PRSC) of Balaguer is "hopeless." He sees Amable Aristy Castro as "a photocopy of Balaguer -- a schemer, dividing factions with money and maneuvers." Former presidential candidate Eduardo Estrella is an honest man, but with nothing more to recommend him. "None of them are real democrats." COMMENT (C) Mejia is a keen observer and still highly influential within the PRD. Although with bluster and exaggeration, he was confirming some important facts: the major opposition party is securely in the hands of wealthy entrepreneur Vargas Maldonado, who has the skills and strengths to mount a powerful campaign against the incumbent Fernandez. A 70 percent approval rating for Fernandez looks good but could well evaporate. And there will be lots of presidential politicking for this Embassy to report on over the next 18 months. ¶2. (U) Drafted by Peter Hemsch. ¶3. (U) This report and extensive other material can be consulted on our SIPRNET site, http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/wha/santodomingo/ BULLEN