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View Full Version : Environmentalists: the backward Constitution



NewsWhore
10-02-2009, 03:20 PM
Dominican environmentalists say the Constitution that is about to be approved by the PLD and PRD majorities in Congress reverses progress that has been made on sustainable environmental protection. At a press conference yesterday, the environmental campaigners said that the new Constitution goes against world trends. "It is contradictory that at these times when international forums discuss coastal management and free public access to beaches, their privatization is encouraged here.
The environmentalists say that in the Constitution as drafted, full of ambiguities and denial of rights, the country would be in violation of international agreements such as the Convention on Biological Diversity, UN Convention on the Law of the Sea and the fulfillment of the Millennium Development Goals.
The Dominican Environmental Movement (MAP) says that the decisions reached in the Second Reading of the Constitution "are not consistent with the general interest of the Dominican nation".
They went on to say: "We invite each community and each citizen to let their representatives know that their rights have been violated, that they did not elect them so they would remove their protection and leave them on their own. An explanation is required".
The environmental movement say changes in matters regarding to environment and natural resources were made to please private interests, a cruel sort of joke and deceit to the Dominican people.
The movement says it now becomes urgent and necessary to call for a true and coherent constitutional reform that adequately incorporates environmental issues and that is discussed and approved by constitutional reformers elected by popular vote only for that purpose and that represent the real interest of the entire nation and not that of particular groups.
The environmentalists say that they want to express that this is not the Constitution that they spent hours working for nor is it the Constitution that the country deserves.

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