NewsWhore
06-21-2007, 03:50 PM
More details have been emerging about the government's purchase of airplanes in Brazil, announced as one of the main achievements of the President's Brazilian tour. President Leonel Fernandez took the opportunity to try out one of the planes during his visit to Brazil this week.
It now seems that the deal was sealed as early as January, according to Diario Libre. Each of the nine units costs US$9.5 million. The problem, though, does not seem to be so much the high cost as the fact that the planes may not even be any use for their stated purpose. Diario Libre points out that the airplanes are best equipped for pilot training, and are not suited to pursue drug traffickers. The authorities justify the purchase on the grounds they are needed to police Dominican airspace. The only countries that have purchased the airplanes are Brazil (99 units) and Colombia (25 units), and now the DR (9 units).
Diario Libre points out that these are the same planes as when during Hipolito Mejia's administration, the opposition (the party currently in power) and the press kicked up such a stink that the purchase was aborted. The Mejia administration went on to purchase helicopters instead.
Yesterday's Listin Diario discredited the PRD legislators and former President Hipolito Mejia from criticizing the purchase of the Brazilian planes on the grounds that when they were in government in 2003 and 2004, they took on a commercial bank loan to purchase 19 Schweizer 333 helicopters at a cost of US$72 million. The newspaper asks where those helicopters are now.
Diario Libre editor-in-chief Adriano Miguel Tejada takes it one step further and says that while the purchase of the helicopters was wrong, the people voted for Leonel Fernandez so that decisions of this kind would not be made again. "It was not so that the government would continue doing more of the same," he comments in an editorial today.
Tejada makes the point that the main objection to the purchase of the planes is in the lack of transparency and the government's failure to hold a bidding process to select the best option for protecting the country's airspace against drug traffickers. Diario Libre points out that the A37 Dragon FL manufactured by Cessna is a better option both price and purpose-wise. The Air Force also has more experience with these airplanes. Miguel Rosado, an aviation expert who is a former dean of the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo (UASD), said that the Tucanos maximum speed is not enough to pursue the airplanes used by the drug traffickers, which include King Air 350, Cessna Citation, Lear Jet 35A and Hocker 700.
Clave Digital explains that the Tucanos airplanes purchased by the Dominican government lost a recent Chilean bid to purchase a fleet to fight drug trafficking. In its Thursday, 21 June edition, the newspaper comments that the US government used to donate airplanes for us to police the skies for drugs en route to the United States, anyway, and should do so now, as they donate equipment to Colombia.
Pilot Amin Canaan told Diario Libre that the country has in fact taken a step backwards with the purchase of those planes because, according to him, planes built in the 50s, 70s and 80s are better equipped for service than the Tucanos.
Yesterday's Diario Libre reported that the money for the deal had been secured by Decree 225-07 dated 19 April 2007, when President Fernandez unified the tourist airport charge at US$13.75. The breakdown of the US$13.75 fund use was: US$4.50 for the Dominican Institute of Civil Aviation (IDAC), US$7 to the Ministry of Tourism (for international promotion and infrastructure projects), US$0.50 for the specialized airport security force (CESA) and US$0.75 for the Air Force and US$1 for the airports. The money to pay the Brazilian financing for the Brazilian planes is contained in the US$0.75 per passenger allotted to the Air Force.
More... (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#5)
It now seems that the deal was sealed as early as January, according to Diario Libre. Each of the nine units costs US$9.5 million. The problem, though, does not seem to be so much the high cost as the fact that the planes may not even be any use for their stated purpose. Diario Libre points out that the airplanes are best equipped for pilot training, and are not suited to pursue drug traffickers. The authorities justify the purchase on the grounds they are needed to police Dominican airspace. The only countries that have purchased the airplanes are Brazil (99 units) and Colombia (25 units), and now the DR (9 units).
Diario Libre points out that these are the same planes as when during Hipolito Mejia's administration, the opposition (the party currently in power) and the press kicked up such a stink that the purchase was aborted. The Mejia administration went on to purchase helicopters instead.
Yesterday's Listin Diario discredited the PRD legislators and former President Hipolito Mejia from criticizing the purchase of the Brazilian planes on the grounds that when they were in government in 2003 and 2004, they took on a commercial bank loan to purchase 19 Schweizer 333 helicopters at a cost of US$72 million. The newspaper asks where those helicopters are now.
Diario Libre editor-in-chief Adriano Miguel Tejada takes it one step further and says that while the purchase of the helicopters was wrong, the people voted for Leonel Fernandez so that decisions of this kind would not be made again. "It was not so that the government would continue doing more of the same," he comments in an editorial today.
Tejada makes the point that the main objection to the purchase of the planes is in the lack of transparency and the government's failure to hold a bidding process to select the best option for protecting the country's airspace against drug traffickers. Diario Libre points out that the A37 Dragon FL manufactured by Cessna is a better option both price and purpose-wise. The Air Force also has more experience with these airplanes. Miguel Rosado, an aviation expert who is a former dean of the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo (UASD), said that the Tucanos maximum speed is not enough to pursue the airplanes used by the drug traffickers, which include King Air 350, Cessna Citation, Lear Jet 35A and Hocker 700.
Clave Digital explains that the Tucanos airplanes purchased by the Dominican government lost a recent Chilean bid to purchase a fleet to fight drug trafficking. In its Thursday, 21 June edition, the newspaper comments that the US government used to donate airplanes for us to police the skies for drugs en route to the United States, anyway, and should do so now, as they donate equipment to Colombia.
Pilot Amin Canaan told Diario Libre that the country has in fact taken a step backwards with the purchase of those planes because, according to him, planes built in the 50s, 70s and 80s are better equipped for service than the Tucanos.
Yesterday's Diario Libre reported that the money for the deal had been secured by Decree 225-07 dated 19 April 2007, when President Fernandez unified the tourist airport charge at US$13.75. The breakdown of the US$13.75 fund use was: US$4.50 for the Dominican Institute of Civil Aviation (IDAC), US$7 to the Ministry of Tourism (for international promotion and infrastructure projects), US$0.50 for the specialized airport security force (CESA) and US$0.75 for the Air Force and US$1 for the airports. The money to pay the Brazilian financing for the Brazilian planes is contained in the US$0.75 per passenger allotted to the Air Force.
More... (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#5)