The opposition for this election is represented by former President Hipólito Mejía (2000-2004) and the PRD (Partido Revolucionario Dominicano). Despite its name it is no longer, and actually never was, a revolutionary party, but it belongs to the Socialist International organisation, and claims to be a social-democratic party. For a Norwegian it feels a stretch to define the PRD as a social-democratic party, today I would say it is a mass-based populist party. Compared to the PLD which is also a mass-based populist party, the PRD has a somewhat more authentic "street-approach", while the more educated PLD seem to be less authentic in their populism, even though the end result is much the same.
The PRD is the oldest party in the country, founded in exile on Cuba in 1939 as an opposition party to the Trujillo-regime (1930-1961). It is the party that in opposition fought Trujillo first to claim democracy for the country, and then Balaguer (1966-1978), and can to a certain extent, claim that the final transition to democracy in 1978 was their victory. It is also the party, represented at the time by Juan Bosch, that won the first free and democratic election in the country in 1962. Juan Bosch was elected President, a position he only had for about 7 months before he was couped by the military. Bosch who was one of the founders of the PRD, left the party in 1973 because he had lost faith both in his mass-based party and in democracy. Now, Bosch sought a dictatorship with popular support, and used the newly founded PLD as his vehicle. PRD was the democratic hero of the 12 years of Balaguer rule (1966-1978), also called "los doce años". The party fought for its and the citizens' democratic rights, and won the final battle in 1978 with the presidential elections that year. Silvestre Antonio Guzmán (PRD) was elected president that year and he presided over the first democratic, uninterrupted electoral period of the Dominican regime. President Guzmán sadly committed suicide in July 1982, just one month before he was to hand power over to Salvador Jorge Blanco (also PRD). Jorge Blanco got to rule during the worst economic crisis of the 1980s in the DR and in Latin America, and has later been remembered (erroneously) as one of the worst and most corrupt presidents of the Dominican Republic. In reality, Blanco's government did manage the country's economy quite well considering all the problems it encountered due to the international economic downturn in the region.
When Jorge Blanco took over power, the PRD was already split in several factions. Guzmán's vice-president (and short-time president) Jacobo Majluta fought for the candidacy in 1982, but Jorge won. After Majluta had lost he fought the Jorge government from the Senate (many say Jorge fought the Guzmán government from the Senate in the previous four years). Majluta won the internals for the presidency for the 1986 elections, but lost the election to Balaguer. Later, Majluta would have to fight Peña Gómez for the presidency, a fight that would lead to a split between the Majluta faction, who left the party and founded the PRI (Partido Revolucionario Institucional) and the Peña Gómez faction (who stayed with the PRD). The split between the two faction was the culmination of a conflict that started back in the 1970s with the battle for the presidency in 1977/78.
The PRD would also later be battled by internal splits. Peña Gómez managed to maintain unity until his death in 1998, and for the 2000 election Hipólito Mejía got half the votes while Joaquín Balaguer (PRSC) and Danilo Medina (PLD) split the remaining half of the votes. In 2002, however, when Hipólito Mejía decided to reform the constitution to open for immediate presidential reelection, the fight was on again in the PRD. Presidential aspirers such as Hatuey De Camps, Fello Suberví, Milagros Ortiz Bosch, Enmanuel Esquea Guerrero, and others were disgusted by Mejía's actions, in particular considering him running a dysmal government that seemed to run the country into an economic havoc (this was not all Mejía's fault, but his rule did not make things better). Mejía's decision was very important for the DR regime since it also opened up for the return of Leonel Fernández, and this decision has been very detrimental to internal party democracy and recruitment of new leaders in the parties and the country as a whole. Under the 1994 constitution Mejía was barred from ever running for presidency again, Mejía changed that in 2002 and at the same time opened up for the Fernández rule 2004-2012. The latest constitutional reform which does not allow reelection, but has no upper limit on how many times one can run for the presidency, opened up for Mejía's current run for the presidency (and eventually President Fernández's future runs for the presidency). Anyway, Mejía's reelection bid split the party (Hatuey DeCamps left the party and created the PRSD) and Mejía became the first Latin American incumbent president since Daniel Ortega in 1990 not to win a reelection bid (many Latin American presidents have of course never had the opportunity to get an immediate reelection).
The 2000-04 rule of Mejía was not a succesful one. First, in 2002 he reformed the constitution to open for immediate presidential reelection. This was unpopular because the PRD was created around the idea of no-reelection since the founders held the belief that reelection had been influential in Trujillo's rise to power and, later, in the prolongation of his rule. The former party leader, Peña Gómez, even wrote his Master thesis in Law about the topic, and was vehemently against reelection of any kind. Second, Mejía ruled when one of the biggest banks in the country went bankrupt, and two more medium-sized banks fell as well. The Baninter case is a story in itself and involved high-end government corruption (of several governments), and most importantly, bankers' illegal use of their clients' money. The crisis was handled relatively poorly, and the government lost more money than necessary over the crisis, but it managed to save the bank clients' money. After international pressure, leaders of Baninter had to go to jail. Third, the Dominican economy was already in shambles when the banks couldn't survive any longer and inflation rose to Venezuelan levels. In 2004, the PRD therefore made its worst electoral performance since 1990 and Leonel Fernández (PLD) won the presidency in a landslide.
Mejía managed to win the open primaries in 2011 by beating PRD president and presidential candidate in 2008, Miguel Vargas Maldonado. Mejía's rise from the dead came as a shock to many, but Vargas Maldonado, who had managed to unite the leadership of the party and counter-arrest the party's tendency of split leadership between the party and the presidential candidates, had abused his powers and ignored internal party democracy. For the 2010 legislative and local election Vargas Maldonado imposed many of his own candidates for the legislature and mayoral election, often bypassing internal democratic processes. This made him increasingly unpopular in PRD circles (many were already annoyed with him due to his fight for a unitary leadership, despite being a formula for division many in the PRD fear concentration of power and prefer divided leadership). Vargas Maldonado also miscalculated the impopularity of Fernández's constitutional reform when he signed a pact with Fernández to carry the constitution in the spring of 2009. The only serious contender to Vargas Maldonado was Hipólito Mejía. Vargas Maldonado has never accepted the loss in the primary and he still claims that Mejía won due to PLD votes in the open primary. His theory, which sounds valid, is that the PLD would rather meet Mejía in the presidential race than himself. However, he has no reason to quarrel, being the PRD president he could of assured a closed primary only open to PRD members instead of organising an open primary open to all adult citizens.
The problem for the PRD, however, is that the most popular candidate within the PRD, Mejía, is the most disliked candidate among supporters of other parties and independents (due to the 2000-04 rule). Therefore, Mejía has faced problems in the electoral campaign, and since the PLD seems to hate him (I know, strong word, but it seems that way), the fact that Mejía is running has raised the tension of the campaign (that plus the fact that it is going to be a very close race). The other problem for the PRD in this campaign is that Miguel Vargas Maldonado, the party's president, has refused to do any campaigning in favour of the party's presidential candidate. The party is again split between the party leadership, or probably just leader, and its presidential candidate. Given these two factors many would say it is quite surprising that the race is as close as it is. With a united party or another candidate, this election could have looked very different for the PRD.
So what about Mejía's campaign? It has not been very programmatic, no campaigns are in this country. If anything it is obvious that the PRD wants to focus on farmers and food-production, which the PRD argues has been ignored by the current administration. Also, Mejía highlights that he will fight poverty, meet social demands, support the 4% of GNI to education, and fight corruption. Apart from that his campaign slogan has been "Llegó Papá" (Father/Daddy is here), a clear reference to the patrimonial political culture that reigns here. Apparently the slogan came about when some of his supporters were waiting for Mejía to arrive at the airport and someone shouted out "Llegó Papá" when they saw him. This slogan caught on and has been used for some time (First Lady and Vice-presidential candidate Margarita Cedeño used Llegó Mamá for some time as well.). The slogan is somewhat inappropriate considering the history of the Island of Hispaniola and that the last president to use the nickname Papá, was the dictator Papa Doc in Haiti.
Mejía's campaign has been on a downward slope for some time. Late last year Mejía was winning according to most independent surveys, but lately Cid/Gallup Hoy, Penn Schoen and Berland, and Diario Libre's Greenberg survey have Medina as winner in the first round. This seems to have diminished somewhat PRD's drive lately. Mejía has also committed what has been perceived by the media and maybe the public, as several blunders. Only one, maybe two, of these are serious. First he said jokingly that if Obama whose ancestors come from Africa, has made it, Dominicans in the USA should also be able to make it. This occurred in an election meeting in New York. The Dominican senate embarrased itself and the nation by sending a communiqué to the president asking forgiveness for Mejía's transgression. Mejía did not say anything untrue, and his point in the speech was rather ok and decent, and curiously Leonel Fernández used almost the exact same words in a speech some years earlier. The other blunder was that Mejía said that domestic workers stole the food from their patrons/bosses. His point was that they were so poor that they had to steal to get by and that he would do something about it. The story was spun that Mejía was accusing this relatively poor group of stealing. The third blunder was that Mejía said that he would revise any current contract the state has with private companies and not pay the contracters if he found out that the contracts were the result of a corruption scheme. To suggest that the state would not uphold contracts is serious, and the PLD and the media used this as evidence that Mejía is erratic. The last blunder, and most serious one, is that Mejía criticised the Supreme Court for being politicised and the judges for being in the pocket of President Fernández. While this may be true, Mejía also added that he'd like to reshuffle the court. This latter statement is serious and is contrary to his desires of a less politicised Supreme Court. Sadly for Mejía this statement ruined what was an otherwise good speech on democracy and the political system of the DR.
Mejía knows he is fighting an upward battle and argues that his fight with Medina is a David vs. Goliat match. I am not sure whether the playing field is that tilted, but I am sure that Mejía would like to repeat David and beat Goliat/the government/PLD/Danilo Medina.
Showing posts with label PRD. Show all posts
Showing posts with label PRD. Show all posts
Monday, 14 May 2012
Saturday, 14 April 2012
Margaritagate and The Danish Debacle
A while back journalist and lawyer (everyone's a lawyer in this country...I think this is because it is the easiest way to be entitled Doctor, since having a master's degree in law gives you the title Dr. in this country), Marcos Martínez of Santiago (the second city, the capital of the Cibao valley and heart, lungs and economic motor of the country), in his morning show on Channel 55 accused the First Lady, and current vice-presidential candidate for the PLD, Margarita Cedeño and senator Félix Bautista, the allegedly and proven corrupt, senator of the PLD for San Juan, of having bank accounts in Den Danske Bank (The Danish Bank, major bank in Denmark) with holdings of 43.8 million €. Martínez argued he had evidence to prove this, but did not produce in the show at that time. Later, however, he did produce the so-called evidence, and it became relatively obvious for any serious person that the accusations were a lie.
Anyway I became rather curious about this. Knowing that all politicians tend to get rich when in power in the DR, I would not be surpised that Fernández/Cedeño family has values of that kind, and we do know Félix Bautista has that kind of money (see one of my previous blogs). Furthermore, it was a Danish connection, and coming from Norway, this was almost like home for me. My gut reaction, however, was that the accusations could not be true. If Denmark is like Norway, you probably couldn't open a private account there without a national identity number, and, more importantly, if you are from the Caribbean and have 40 million € to hide, would you pick Denmark over let's say the Cayman Islands?
The whole story tells us something about the media in the DR, both the fringe, unserious media, represented by Marcos Martínez, and the mainstream media which is paralysed by its self-censorship (a fact that is much more evident in the Félix Bautista case than in this case, and in a host of other cases of scandals involving important people). Furthermore it gives insight into differences in political culture between Scandinavia and the DR, and teaches us the value of having a professional, autonomous and politically independent bureaucracy (even though we might dislike bureaucracy in Scandinavia as well, some time in the DR or other places like the DR, teaches you the value of rules and regulations that are upheld by the state).
Let me quickly first take up the story again. First, in February 2012 Martínez accuses the first lady and current vice-presidential candidate for owning a bank account with more than 40 million € in Den Danske Bank. Martínez had no evidence, but said he had evidence securely stored and would present them at a later date (first sign that this is a lie). Then, what struck me was that no serious newspaper or media picked up on this (that means they thought this could be true). Canal 55 and Martínez's show is a far way off mainstream media and any impact on the daily political agenda. Nevertheless, such an accusation, true or false, would have been great news-stuff in most other countries. In what seems to be a pattern, however, the main news-media only pick up critical stories of people close to power (the presidency, senators, ministers) when the accused denies the story. By denying the scandal, the accused has confirmed the accusation exists and it is ok for regular media to cover the story (the coverage, however, is generally that the negation of the accusation gets great coverage, while the accusation and potential evidence, do not). So when Margarita denied the accusations on twitter, if I remember correctly, and then stated that she would sue him for diffamation and what have you, the case exploded in the mainstream media (as a contrast the Félixgate, which actually seems true and involved high-end corruption in DR and Haiti, still receives little news coverage), and became dubbed the Margaritagate.
Sadly, and typically, the media and politicians here were more interested in the accusations and refutations among the politicians than finding out whether the whole thing was true. The Prosecutor General for instance should have been very interested in this. If it were true, then he could probably accuse the First Lady of tax evasion, corruption and what have you (in the USA this Prosecutor/Attorney General would have made a career on this, not so in the DR). If it were false, then he could run a case against the journalist for lies, defamation, etc. In the end the prosecutor general was not interested in doing anything (maybe out of fear that the accusations were true?). Therefore, I took matters into my own hands and contacted and tipped off two respectable Danish newspapers, one of which was interested and took the case. This was Berlingske Tidende which wrote this article on the matter. Apparently at the time via Facebook, Dominicans had sent messages to Den Danske Bank asking for information about the First lady's supposed account, but gotten the answer that any account information was classified and could not be released. The Berlingske Tidende article basically said that Den Danske Bank could not release any information about their clients, and that the Financial Supervisory Authority of Denmark could not give any statement about this either.
On behalf of the First Lady, the President of the Dominican Superintendence of the Banks, Ng Cortiñas, however, had gotten in contact with his Danish colleague, who informally had said to his Dominican colleague that no such bank account existed. This information, which the Danish Financial Supervisory Authority had gotten from Den Danske Bank, had to be kept a secret since the Danish Bank and the Financial Supervisory Authority officially could not give out such information. As a favour to his Dominican peer, the Danish helped the First lady out. Here, however, is where the culture clash and difference between a professional and politicised bureaucracy create problems in Denmark and DR.
While the Danish boss of the FSA is a professional (economist, I presume), the Dominican President of the Superintendencia de Bancos is a politician. Now that Ng Cortiñas (the president of the Superintendencia de Bancos) had gotten confirmed that the First Lady did not have a bank account in Den Danske Bank, he immediately held a press conference stating that Mikkel Holle from FSA in Denmark had confirmed this. The problem occurred when Berlingske Tidende asked Mikkel Holle about this and he of course had to deny to ever have given out any information to his Dominican colleague (which if it were true, would have been illegal). The Danish FSA of course assumed that the information would be handled with discretion and not used politically. The danes probably expected that Ng Cortiñas would tell this to the prosecutor general and maybe the president.
The case had indeed become political at that time. Marcos Martínez who originally made the accusation, was a former member of the PRD and its 1980s splinter party the PRI, and the PLD (the First Lady's party) used this information to discredit Martínez. He did not need much discrediting, really, because after some time he presented the following picture from a supposed internet bank account as evidence for the First Lady's and Félix Bautista's supposed accounts (on YouTube you can find several analyses of why these are false).
PRD followers, on the other hand, took the pictures to be real evidence and were even more strongly convinced that Margarita indeed had this account together with her brother Alberto Cedeño and the "crook" Félix Bautista. Furthermore, as news of the Berlingske Tidende news story came to the DR (it helped that BT translated the story into English), the PRD had reason to question Ng Cortiñas's story where he stated that his Danish colleagues had cleaned the First Lady's name. Now, with evidence from Denmark the PRD could say that what Ng Cortiñas told during the press conference was a lie. So the culture clash between the Dominican and Danish Bank superintendents also came back to haunt the Dominican government. Mikkel Holle, who Ng Cortiñas said he had spoken to, said he was surprised to be quoted in Dominican newspapers. In this case the Dominican Bank supervisor had fooled his Danish counterpart in order to score political points, but in the end he ended up raising more doubts about the First Lady. According to what I know from my sources, the conversation, or exchange of information between Denmark and the DR did actually take place, and it was confirmed that the First Lady does not have a bank account in Den Danske Bank (and of course, the evidence presented is false).
I was quoted in Berlingske Tidende that the opposition would believe this story, and that the PLD supporters would not believe this story, no matter the evidence. Even though in the previous blog I stated that during these electoral times one cannot trust surveys, I will here present an interesting graph demonstrating to which degree people now believe the First Lady actually has a bank account in Denmark. This survey was done by Greenberg on behalf of the newspaper Diario Libre (if anything, this survey was probably tilted in favour of the PRD), and more or less confirm my comment to BT.
Source: Diario Libre, Tuesday April 3.
The columns show whether people think the accusations were true (Verdadero) false (Falso) or whether they do not know, or do not want to answer (No sabe/se rehúsa), and separate the answer according to which party the respondents will vote for on May 20. Only 8% of the PLD supporters believe the accusations to be true, while 55% of the PRD supporters have the same faith (33% in total population). Interestingly a full 21% of the PRD supporters believe them to be false, and also a 24% do not answer or do not know. The survey at least demonstrates that if accusations against your own party comes from the opposition, you will not trust them, and if the accusations come from your own against the other party, you are likely to trust them, but not blindly. There is therefore clearly a divide between the parties here, and it might lead us to speculate whether the revelations of so-called scandals may have any effect on the vote on May 20. Clearly in this case the evidence were really poor, but a better test might be the case of Félix Bautista and his corruption schemes which are well-documented (but silenced in the media). Will people from the PLD believe these accusations? If so, will that have any effect on their inclination to switch and vote for the PRD? The answer to the latter also depends on the likeability of the PRD candidate (which is not very high). Given the tightness of the DR election, even false scandals like this may have the sufficient effect to sway the election one way or the other, but I think the number of scandals that now pop up just is overkill and make the scandals lose any effect they might have...
Another problem with such false scandals and accusations is that they for one take away attention from the real scandals (the government is right now smoke-screening the Félix Bautista scandal inventing that a close associate and proven corrupted dirt-bag, of Hipólito Mejía may be complotting to remove President Martelly in Haiti), and false scandals make the real scandals less reliable.
Therefore it is important to know how you recognize a real scandal from a false one here in the DR, here are some ground rules:
1) False announcements of scandals are never accompanied with evidence right away. More often than not, the announcer would say that evidence is hidden to protect the announcer, and threaten to reveal the evidence any moment. Real scandals are presented with evidence right away, and almost always unequivocal evidence.
2) False announcements of scandals often come from political parties or people alligned with political parties, and regards the opposing party. Real scandals are almost always presented by Nuria Piera (and occassionally local journalists, Alicia Ortega or Acento.com.do)
3) False announcements of scandals generally get more attention in the media than real scandals. If they are against the government there is no risk in publishing them since they are false. If they are against the opposition the more attention the scandal is given the more damage it may make. Real scandals are never given much attention in mainstream media such as El Caribe, Hoy, Listín Diario until the denial is out and then only the denials are given attention.
4) False announcements of scandals are more often than not met with reactions that the scandalised victim will sue the announcer for defamation. There is no risk for the scandalised victim to go to court. If the accusations were true, evidence might get out, so a day in court is to be avoided at all costs. Real scandals are met with silence and denial, no one is sued.
The Martínez case is for now, getting to an end. Martínez has been summoned to court and has met the prosecutor in Santiago for interrogation on the matter. He still holds his information to be true (who wouldn't in this part of the world, admitting a lie or that you were wrong would clearly be against the "Claro!" culture nicely described by Diego Gambetta some years back), and Martínez even put out more evidence that the First Lady had made illegal payments to suppliers here in the DR as well. Martínez's morning show was also closed down last week. Explanations for the reason why, differ according to which party you belong to. The Canal 55 owners say it is because Martínez failed to show up for a couple of shows (which Martínez explains with being "held hostage" in his own home due to the police watching/surrounding his house making it impossible for him go get out). Martínez, however, argues that his show was closed down due to political pressure from the PLD. As always there are two versions here in the DR: the official version and the anti-government version. And, as always, no one is really interested in finding out which is closest to the truth.
Martínez will get his day in court since he was sued by the First Lady. He might get sentenced, probably just fined, we'll see, but since this was clearly a blunt lie, it seems obvious that he will lose any case in court. Should, however, the PRD win the presidential elections on May 20, I will not be surprised if Martínez will be back as a journalist quite soon, or get a good job in the new government. Hipólito Mejía, for instance, said when he was in New York during Easter, that he believes Martínez's accusations to be true, which is not surprising coming from that guy. Mejía has a very interesting view and vision of reality, and has, just as President Leonel Fernández, no problems working with previously convicted persons.
Anyway I became rather curious about this. Knowing that all politicians tend to get rich when in power in the DR, I would not be surpised that Fernández/Cedeño family has values of that kind, and we do know Félix Bautista has that kind of money (see one of my previous blogs). Furthermore, it was a Danish connection, and coming from Norway, this was almost like home for me. My gut reaction, however, was that the accusations could not be true. If Denmark is like Norway, you probably couldn't open a private account there without a national identity number, and, more importantly, if you are from the Caribbean and have 40 million € to hide, would you pick Denmark over let's say the Cayman Islands?
The whole story tells us something about the media in the DR, both the fringe, unserious media, represented by Marcos Martínez, and the mainstream media which is paralysed by its self-censorship (a fact that is much more evident in the Félix Bautista case than in this case, and in a host of other cases of scandals involving important people). Furthermore it gives insight into differences in political culture between Scandinavia and the DR, and teaches us the value of having a professional, autonomous and politically independent bureaucracy (even though we might dislike bureaucracy in Scandinavia as well, some time in the DR or other places like the DR, teaches you the value of rules and regulations that are upheld by the state).
Let me quickly first take up the story again. First, in February 2012 Martínez accuses the first lady and current vice-presidential candidate for owning a bank account with more than 40 million € in Den Danske Bank. Martínez had no evidence, but said he had evidence securely stored and would present them at a later date (first sign that this is a lie). Then, what struck me was that no serious newspaper or media picked up on this (that means they thought this could be true). Canal 55 and Martínez's show is a far way off mainstream media and any impact on the daily political agenda. Nevertheless, such an accusation, true or false, would have been great news-stuff in most other countries. In what seems to be a pattern, however, the main news-media only pick up critical stories of people close to power (the presidency, senators, ministers) when the accused denies the story. By denying the scandal, the accused has confirmed the accusation exists and it is ok for regular media to cover the story (the coverage, however, is generally that the negation of the accusation gets great coverage, while the accusation and potential evidence, do not). So when Margarita denied the accusations on twitter, if I remember correctly, and then stated that she would sue him for diffamation and what have you, the case exploded in the mainstream media (as a contrast the Félixgate, which actually seems true and involved high-end corruption in DR and Haiti, still receives little news coverage), and became dubbed the Margaritagate.
Sadly, and typically, the media and politicians here were more interested in the accusations and refutations among the politicians than finding out whether the whole thing was true. The Prosecutor General for instance should have been very interested in this. If it were true, then he could probably accuse the First Lady of tax evasion, corruption and what have you (in the USA this Prosecutor/Attorney General would have made a career on this, not so in the DR). If it were false, then he could run a case against the journalist for lies, defamation, etc. In the end the prosecutor general was not interested in doing anything (maybe out of fear that the accusations were true?). Therefore, I took matters into my own hands and contacted and tipped off two respectable Danish newspapers, one of which was interested and took the case. This was Berlingske Tidende which wrote this article on the matter. Apparently at the time via Facebook, Dominicans had sent messages to Den Danske Bank asking for information about the First lady's supposed account, but gotten the answer that any account information was classified and could not be released. The Berlingske Tidende article basically said that Den Danske Bank could not release any information about their clients, and that the Financial Supervisory Authority of Denmark could not give any statement about this either.
On behalf of the First Lady, the President of the Dominican Superintendence of the Banks, Ng Cortiñas, however, had gotten in contact with his Danish colleague, who informally had said to his Dominican colleague that no such bank account existed. This information, which the Danish Financial Supervisory Authority had gotten from Den Danske Bank, had to be kept a secret since the Danish Bank and the Financial Supervisory Authority officially could not give out such information. As a favour to his Dominican peer, the Danish helped the First lady out. Here, however, is where the culture clash and difference between a professional and politicised bureaucracy create problems in Denmark and DR.
While the Danish boss of the FSA is a professional (economist, I presume), the Dominican President of the Superintendencia de Bancos is a politician. Now that Ng Cortiñas (the president of the Superintendencia de Bancos) had gotten confirmed that the First Lady did not have a bank account in Den Danske Bank, he immediately held a press conference stating that Mikkel Holle from FSA in Denmark had confirmed this. The problem occurred when Berlingske Tidende asked Mikkel Holle about this and he of course had to deny to ever have given out any information to his Dominican colleague (which if it were true, would have been illegal). The Danish FSA of course assumed that the information would be handled with discretion and not used politically. The danes probably expected that Ng Cortiñas would tell this to the prosecutor general and maybe the president.
The case had indeed become political at that time. Marcos Martínez who originally made the accusation, was a former member of the PRD and its 1980s splinter party the PRI, and the PLD (the First Lady's party) used this information to discredit Martínez. He did not need much discrediting, really, because after some time he presented the following picture from a supposed internet bank account as evidence for the First Lady's and Félix Bautista's supposed accounts (on YouTube you can find several analyses of why these are false).
I was quoted in Berlingske Tidende that the opposition would believe this story, and that the PLD supporters would not believe this story, no matter the evidence. Even though in the previous blog I stated that during these electoral times one cannot trust surveys, I will here present an interesting graph demonstrating to which degree people now believe the First Lady actually has a bank account in Denmark. This survey was done by Greenberg on behalf of the newspaper Diario Libre (if anything, this survey was probably tilted in favour of the PRD), and more or less confirm my comment to BT.
Source: Diario Libre, Tuesday April 3.
The columns show whether people think the accusations were true (Verdadero) false (Falso) or whether they do not know, or do not want to answer (No sabe/se rehúsa), and separate the answer according to which party the respondents will vote for on May 20. Only 8% of the PLD supporters believe the accusations to be true, while 55% of the PRD supporters have the same faith (33% in total population). Interestingly a full 21% of the PRD supporters believe them to be false, and also a 24% do not answer or do not know. The survey at least demonstrates that if accusations against your own party comes from the opposition, you will not trust them, and if the accusations come from your own against the other party, you are likely to trust them, but not blindly. There is therefore clearly a divide between the parties here, and it might lead us to speculate whether the revelations of so-called scandals may have any effect on the vote on May 20. Clearly in this case the evidence were really poor, but a better test might be the case of Félix Bautista and his corruption schemes which are well-documented (but silenced in the media). Will people from the PLD believe these accusations? If so, will that have any effect on their inclination to switch and vote for the PRD? The answer to the latter also depends on the likeability of the PRD candidate (which is not very high). Given the tightness of the DR election, even false scandals like this may have the sufficient effect to sway the election one way or the other, but I think the number of scandals that now pop up just is overkill and make the scandals lose any effect they might have...
Another problem with such false scandals and accusations is that they for one take away attention from the real scandals (the government is right now smoke-screening the Félix Bautista scandal inventing that a close associate and proven corrupted dirt-bag, of Hipólito Mejía may be complotting to remove President Martelly in Haiti), and false scandals make the real scandals less reliable.
Therefore it is important to know how you recognize a real scandal from a false one here in the DR, here are some ground rules:
1) False announcements of scandals are never accompanied with evidence right away. More often than not, the announcer would say that evidence is hidden to protect the announcer, and threaten to reveal the evidence any moment. Real scandals are presented with evidence right away, and almost always unequivocal evidence.
2) False announcements of scandals often come from political parties or people alligned with political parties, and regards the opposing party. Real scandals are almost always presented by Nuria Piera (and occassionally local journalists, Alicia Ortega or Acento.com.do)
3) False announcements of scandals generally get more attention in the media than real scandals. If they are against the government there is no risk in publishing them since they are false. If they are against the opposition the more attention the scandal is given the more damage it may make. Real scandals are never given much attention in mainstream media such as El Caribe, Hoy, Listín Diario until the denial is out and then only the denials are given attention.
4) False announcements of scandals are more often than not met with reactions that the scandalised victim will sue the announcer for defamation. There is no risk for the scandalised victim to go to court. If the accusations were true, evidence might get out, so a day in court is to be avoided at all costs. Real scandals are met with silence and denial, no one is sued.
The Martínez case is for now, getting to an end. Martínez has been summoned to court and has met the prosecutor in Santiago for interrogation on the matter. He still holds his information to be true (who wouldn't in this part of the world, admitting a lie or that you were wrong would clearly be against the "Claro!" culture nicely described by Diego Gambetta some years back), and Martínez even put out more evidence that the First Lady had made illegal payments to suppliers here in the DR as well. Martínez's morning show was also closed down last week. Explanations for the reason why, differ according to which party you belong to. The Canal 55 owners say it is because Martínez failed to show up for a couple of shows (which Martínez explains with being "held hostage" in his own home due to the police watching/surrounding his house making it impossible for him go get out). Martínez, however, argues that his show was closed down due to political pressure from the PLD. As always there are two versions here in the DR: the official version and the anti-government version. And, as always, no one is really interested in finding out which is closest to the truth.
Martínez will get his day in court since he was sued by the First Lady. He might get sentenced, probably just fined, we'll see, but since this was clearly a blunt lie, it seems obvious that he will lose any case in court. Should, however, the PRD win the presidential elections on May 20, I will not be surprised if Martínez will be back as a journalist quite soon, or get a good job in the new government. Hipólito Mejía, for instance, said when he was in New York during Easter, that he believes Martínez's accusations to be true, which is not surprising coming from that guy. Mejía has a very interesting view and vision of reality, and has, just as President Leonel Fernández, no problems working with previously convicted persons.
Monday, 9 April 2012
The War of the Surveys
Semana Santa is over, and the latest bulletin from COE (Centro de Operaciones de Emergencia) reports that 40 people died during Easter week this year (16 more than last year). The majority died in traffic accidents, and the majority of dead in traffic accidents are motor cyclists (probably without a helmet). The last day of Semana Santa also brought the first dead of this electoral campaign as fighting turned into gunshots between PLD and PRD supporters during campaigning in Moca. One PRD supporter died and a PLD activist was wounded. During the easter week the candidates had promised not to do any campaigning, so Mejía and Medina went to the USA to campaign there (since campaigning abroad was not mentioned in the Pacto de Civilidad the candidates signed a week before Easter). The major parties' activists, however, campaigned both on Thursday and on Easter Sunday, when traffic in and out of the cities was the highest, creating a lot of extra traffic jams and frustration among people.
Now that Easter is over, the quiet week turns into a noisy last 40 days of electoral campaigning. I am taking a lot of taxis in the capital these days, and most taxistas say that it doesn't matter who wins as long as there only is one round of elections (In fact a political cartoonist from El Día argued today that Jesus Christ's suffering only lasted the Long Friday, while the Dominican people's suffering would last until May 20, ie. election day). A particular feat of the campaigns in the DR is "la guerra de las encuestas", the war of the Surveys, and today I got to experience a little part of that when I went to a press conference organised by Benenson Strategy Group (see also Wikipedia) who wanted to publicise their latest survey. Before I get to that survey, let me briefly display this "war" between the top two candidates.
The bandwagon effect is well known among behaviouralists and within political science and electoral studies. The idea is that people feel better if they support the winner, and that makes some voters vote for the candidate that seems most likely to win the election (independent of what they think of this candidate). The opposite effect would be the underdog effect, but of the two, the bandwagon effect has gotten more attention and seems to be more solidly supported by evidence and studies. The parties in the DR must think that the bandwagon effect is particularly strong here, because both major candidates put great effort into publishing that the surveys put them on top and a sure winner in the first round. Therefore walking the streets of Santo Domingo you can see that part of Danilo Medina's strategy is basically to show that a majority supports him, see for instance this poster (even though the guy you see on the photo in the lower right corner, and his three other friends (not in the photo) playing domino on a street off the Malecón in Santo Domingo on Saturday April 7, all said they supported "Papá", ie. Hipólito Mejía).
Several places in the city you'll see the posters showing that either 52 or 56% prefers Danilo or thinks that Danilo will win the election. Both parties also pay for full page ads in the major newspapers. On Wednesday 4 of April, Danilo reports that all surveys show him as winner in the first round, referring to ASISA's survey of March 27 and 28 which as Medina as winner with 52.8% against Mejía's 45% (others 2.2%), and NEWLINK Research's survey from March 31-April 1, which has the Danilo/Margarita ticket(-s) as winner with 49.1% against Mejía/Abinader with 44%. Today, on April 9, however, Hipólitio Mejía and the PRD retaliated with a full page in El Día, El Nacional, and Hoy (and potentially other newspapers) stating "change is coming" and that the surveys confirm it. Even though Medina said that all surveys point to him as winner, Mejía could present at least four surveys that disagree with Medina. According to Mejía's ad, Bendixen and Amandi's survey from March 23-31 has Mejía as winner with 51.4% against Medina's 39.7%, JZ analytics (31 March) has 49% for Mejía, 44% for Medina, Ana María Acevedo (27-30 March) has Mejía/Abinader with 51.8% and Medina/Cedeño with 44.7%, and Greenberg-Diario Libre has Mejía with 49% and Medina with 46%. My summary of these surveys is just below, and an average of all these surveys (plus the Benenson Strategy group survey) puts Mejía just above Medina with 47.2 against 46.3% (but bear in mind that this includes four surveys used in Mejía adds, two used in Medina adds, and the Benenson survey, which for reasons I deal with below, I am sure will be used in Medina adds soon. This gives Mejía a 4-3 edge in surveys for this average calculation).
So why are the surveys so important? Well, there are reasons to believe that the Bandwagon effect should be strong in the DR, although I have never seen any evidence that substantiates this. First of all, the DR is a clientelistic society and state. Literally thousands of people are promised jobs by the candidates during the campaign, and the candidates will deliver as best as they can if they win office. If you belong to the winner you increase your chances tremendously of getting a "botella", i.e. a state-job won through clientelism, or being put on the nomina which puts you on the payroll without you having to work; and if you are with the loser you are guaranteed not to get either. If you can demonstrate that during the campaign you worked for the winner, you own a party membership card, and so on, you have a shot. The bandwagon effect could be important for everyone trying to decide the last few months and wants to become active in the campaign with the motive of winning a state job. Second, as mentioned in an earlier blog, there are virtually no ideological differences between the two main parties, which both started out on the left, but are now relatively conservative parties. The less ideology means in an election, the more likely it is that voters may be swayed by other motives, such as a bandwagon effect. Third, many do not want a second round and may vote for the likely winner according to the surveys just to avoid a round number 2 (there is a ballotage if no candidate gets 50%+1 vote in the first round), which is likely to enhance a bandwagon effect.
Most of these surveys cannot be taken seriously, and I do not trust any of these now that election day is getting closer. Historically it is Hamilton and Gallup that have produced the most reliable surveys here, but I have not seen any of these doing surveys in March. In February Hamilton reported that Medina had 50% vs. Mejía's 45% (and given the margin of error that is a technical draw). The latest example of a non-trustworthy survey is the one from the respectable US firm Benenson Strategy group. This is a firm that does surveys, but mainly to be used to provide consults to politicians, find political solutions, etc. See their webpage: http://www.bsgco.com. Benenson reports that Juan Manuel Santos, Barack Obama, UK Labour Party and other prominent politicians are and have been their clients. They sell information to politicians and give politicians advice (a bit like accounting firms/consulting firms doing accounting and consulting for the same companies, recent US history demonstrates that this was a bad combination). So Benenson is a serious firm, but normally hired by politicians for (among other things) survey-based advice, which in the DR context makes them unreliable given that potentially the best advice Benenson could give a candidate is to demonstrate strength in surveys, and then produce this survey.
Anyway, today, April 9, at 10 am Benenson called for a press conference at the relatively new hotel Holiday Inn in the posh area of Lincoln Avenue (fun fact is that while Holiday Inn is a moderately priced hotel/motel in the USA, in the DR Holiday Inn is a luxury, business hotel which is more expensive than the luxurious Inter-Continental hotel in Santo Domingo that belongs to the same chain of hotels). As demonstrated in the graph above, Benenson could report 48% for Medina and 40% for Mejía when all candidates were included; asked about the ticket (but excluding other candidates) 51% for Medina/Cedeño vs. 43% for Mejía/Abinader; it was pointed out that Medina/Cedeño was strong among women (55% vs. 37%); that the majority (51%) thinks Medina will win in the first round; that Mejía has the strongest rejection among voters, 39% say they would never vote for Mejía, only 27% say the same about Medina; that 77% say that the election will be decided in the first round and that among these 77%, 57% think that Danilo Medina will win (39% think Mejía would win); and that 54% were more satisfied with the Fernández government (2004-2012), while 43% less satisfied with the Fernández government compared to the Mejía government (2000-2004).
There are many things to say about the presentation of this survey, all of which convinces me that this survey is ordered by PLD, the Medina (and in particular the Cedeño) faction or companies close to the PLD/Medina/Cedeño. But, first I have to declare that since I was not a journalist I did not receive the CD with the background data material that the survey is based on, I only received the print-out of the PPT slides that the Benenson representatives showed at the press-release. Therefore these comments are based on my impression from that press-conference and from the PPT-slides. Even though I am quite confident that this survey is ordered by the PLD, or indirectly by the PLD, this does not mean that the numbers the survey shows are wrong. On that account I can only say that I have no way of knowing whether they are correct or wrong. Second, according to the PPT-slides the survey is based on 1200 respondents, which should make out a reprentative sample, and the margin is +/- 2.83 points.
There are five elements that convince me the PLD is behind this survey: 1) the questions, which all are centered around what seems to be Danilo Medina's message in this campaign; 2) the slides; 3) the presentation of the slides by Benenson; 4) the fact that Benenson would not say who hired them; 5) the type of firm Benenson is.
1) Danilo has centered his message on several key issues, most of which were covered with questions in this survey. Medina focuses on the fact that he shall win the women, and together with Margarita Cedeño he highlights the women's importance, arguing that Margarita gives Danilo a dimension that Abinader does not give Mejía. Second, as mentioned above as well, Medina argues not only that he will win, he will win in the first round, and that he is the candidate that most people think will win (in addition to being the candidate that most people would vote for). Third, Medina and the PLD works as hard as they can to link Mejía (rightfully) to his disastrous rule in 2000-2004, and that is the worst (and most disliked) politician of this century. Fourth, even though Medina offers slogans of "cambio", it is qualified as "cambio seguro", which points out the insecurity of the erratic Mejía. In addition, Medina points out that he will continue that which is good. All of these elements were covered by questions in the survey. The survey's questions thus fits Medina's message quite well, and as such, works to confirm what Medina is arguing day in and day out to the public. The survey first points out that Danilo is more popular than Mejía, then by adding the vice-presidency to the ticket (and by excluding the rest of the candidates), the survey suggests that Margarita brings more to the table than Abinader (Mejía's vice-presidential candidate), which is victory in the first round for Medina. Then it looks at gender-support for the ticket, demonstrating strong female support for Medina/Cedeño, before it builds on Medina's message that people no matter what they vote, think that he will win, and with another question asking the ones who knows who to vote for whether they think it will be decided in the first round and who they think will win (yes, Medina). Finally, supporting Medina's message of "cambio seguro" and continue what is good, it looks at the rejection rate of the candidates and compares Fernández with Medina. The questions (and sum of answers) all fit Medina's message too well.
All of this is done quite well, and are relatively weak circumstantial evidence for my hypothesis. Therefore, I turn the attention to the slides which includes a couple of, maybe, equally weak circumstantial evidence (the reader will have to judge this). First of all, the slides highlights Medina's positive results through headings, everything in the text is written as to underscore the strength of Medina instead of presenting dull, statistical survey results, and to convince us that Medina will win in the first round. Only Medina is mentioned in headings with one exception to highlight Mejía's high rejection percentage. Second, as a consequence of the first point, Mejía's name is almost never mentioned, all is about Medina and Margarita Cedeño, and strangely enough Margarita Cedeño is always mentioned with first and last name, Medina only with first name (is it because she is a woman?, or is there some other reason?). 3) On the gender-based breakdown of support for the candidates, the slide highlights and circles how more women than men support Medina, it does not highlight that more men than women support Mejía. Granted, this difference is smaller, but could have been mentioned. All in all, the slides seem created to convince that Medina is the sure bet, which fits well with a theory that you believe the bandwagon-effect is important.
The presentation in itself also supports, in my view, the tendencies I note above. The oral presentation seemed to aim to convince us Medina would win. But, given the fact that these guys are professional survey analysts, some strange corners were cut in the presentation (and on the slides) that made Medina look better. First is the strange assessment by the presenter (who I think was Giancarlo Sopo, but I am not sure, I arrived a bit late) that when including Cedeño in the question the survey demonstrates Medina would win in the first round (and implying her importance being greater than Abinader's). This is basically a white lie given the fact that this question only asked about preference of the two main tickets Medina/Cedeño and Mejía/Abinader and excluded the smaller parties. Therefore Medina reached the 50% threshold, it was not because Cedeño was added. In fact Benenson's own numbers give Medina a three point increase when adding Cedeño to the question (and excluding all minor parties/candidates), but the same is the result for Mejía/Abinader. Also, the oral presentation highlighted all the positive numbers for Medina/Cedeño and highlighted any negative numbers for Mejía without any caveats. Again, I repeat myself, my impression is that the presentation was made to convince us that Medina would win, not to present dry results.
When asked by a journalist who had commissioned this survey, Benenson answered "a group of private companies" whose identity they could not disclose. This is probably true. A group of companies may have paid for this on a promise of anonymity. For all we know these companies might be owned by Félix Bautista (see my previous blog). However, given this fact, I do not trust the survey. Surveys may be manipulated and I see no valid reason why some companies, whichever they are, should want to hide themselves if they order a survey done. Of the surveys listed above, we know who ordered one of seven. This is the one ordered by Diario Libre, and in my view is the most reliable of the ones I have registered in March (but a source in the PLD tells me that these figures were fixed before published in the Diario Libre...if that is true, I do not know, but what is clear is that Diario Libre did what they could to present Mejía in a positive light in their presentation of that survey, and that on the second day of releasing results from the survey it became clear that Mejía's lead over Medina was somewhat more qualified than what was presented the first day). Given the fact that the DR is a democracy, albeit imperfect, there is no reason to hold back who orders a survey unless you want to hide that it may have been ordered for political reasons (which I believe is the case here).
Finally, Benenson lives of giving advice to politicians and uses surveys to do so. The use of surveys is used to fine-tune politicians' message, not to report results and inform the public. Therefore I am not surprised that the questions fit Medina's message so well (this, however, is no reason for the survey company to cheat with the survey, but many results can be created by the formulation of questions, etc). Benenson in fact brags in their webpages of all the politicians they have worked for (and they are mostly politicians...can the PLD be considered a private company?), why would they suddenly want to keep this a secret now. It could be nice for Benenson to have the PLD and Leonel Fernández as clients. Fernández holds a very good name in Latin America, why not put that on their webpage? I believe this survey is made with the purpose of giving advice to Medina and Cedeño, which is what Benenson does. It is therefore not an objective survey, and I do not trust its results. It may be that the correct figures are presented, or it might be that the correct figures are only presented to the candidates to fine-tune the message, and that Benenson gave advice to "juice" the official stats to win more support. We cannot know. I can basically see no reason for why Benenson would harm their name in producing bad surveys, but then again, they will do what is best for whoever contracts them. If the presented results are false, I presume the candidates have seen the correct results. The only motive for not presenting the correct results must be the fear of not getting a contract renewal for another survey if the results are bad for the candidate. But, as mentioned, I have not seen the data material and cannot say anything about the veracity of the results presented. What I do think I have argued well for is that Benenson's message seemed like ordered by the PLD: The questions, the slides and the presentation fit Medina's message extremely well, they seem created to convince the public that Medina is a sure bet, and therefore seem biased and non-trustworthy.
I must finally add that this long story of a survey which I think is paid for by the PLD or companies that support the PLD, is only one of probably many such examples in this (and previous) campaigns. I will probably not write extensively about other politicised surveys, but I want to add that this could just as well have been a story about a survey ordered by the PRD. I happened to write about this one since I had the opportunity to go to this press-conference.
Now that Easter is over, the quiet week turns into a noisy last 40 days of electoral campaigning. I am taking a lot of taxis in the capital these days, and most taxistas say that it doesn't matter who wins as long as there only is one round of elections (In fact a political cartoonist from El Día argued today that Jesus Christ's suffering only lasted the Long Friday, while the Dominican people's suffering would last until May 20, ie. election day). A particular feat of the campaigns in the DR is "la guerra de las encuestas", the war of the Surveys, and today I got to experience a little part of that when I went to a press conference organised by Benenson Strategy Group (see also Wikipedia) who wanted to publicise their latest survey. Before I get to that survey, let me briefly display this "war" between the top two candidates.
The bandwagon effect is well known among behaviouralists and within political science and electoral studies. The idea is that people feel better if they support the winner, and that makes some voters vote for the candidate that seems most likely to win the election (independent of what they think of this candidate). The opposite effect would be the underdog effect, but of the two, the bandwagon effect has gotten more attention and seems to be more solidly supported by evidence and studies. The parties in the DR must think that the bandwagon effect is particularly strong here, because both major candidates put great effort into publishing that the surveys put them on top and a sure winner in the first round. Therefore walking the streets of Santo Domingo you can see that part of Danilo Medina's strategy is basically to show that a majority supports him, see for instance this poster (even though the guy you see on the photo in the lower right corner, and his three other friends (not in the photo) playing domino on a street off the Malecón in Santo Domingo on Saturday April 7, all said they supported "Papá", ie. Hipólito Mejía).
Several places in the city you'll see the posters showing that either 52 or 56% prefers Danilo or thinks that Danilo will win the election. Both parties also pay for full page ads in the major newspapers. On Wednesday 4 of April, Danilo reports that all surveys show him as winner in the first round, referring to ASISA's survey of March 27 and 28 which as Medina as winner with 52.8% against Mejía's 45% (others 2.2%), and NEWLINK Research's survey from March 31-April 1, which has the Danilo/Margarita ticket(-s) as winner with 49.1% against Mejía/Abinader with 44%. Today, on April 9, however, Hipólitio Mejía and the PRD retaliated with a full page in El Día, El Nacional, and Hoy (and potentially other newspapers) stating "change is coming" and that the surveys confirm it. Even though Medina said that all surveys point to him as winner, Mejía could present at least four surveys that disagree with Medina. According to Mejía's ad, Bendixen and Amandi's survey from March 23-31 has Mejía as winner with 51.4% against Medina's 39.7%, JZ analytics (31 March) has 49% for Mejía, 44% for Medina, Ana María Acevedo (27-30 March) has Mejía/Abinader with 51.8% and Medina/Cedeño with 44.7%, and Greenberg-Diario Libre has Mejía with 49% and Medina with 46%. My summary of these surveys is just below, and an average of all these surveys (plus the Benenson Strategy group survey) puts Mejía just above Medina with 47.2 against 46.3% (but bear in mind that this includes four surveys used in Mejía adds, two used in Medina adds, and the Benenson survey, which for reasons I deal with below, I am sure will be used in Medina adds soon. This gives Mejía a 4-3 edge in surveys for this average calculation).
So why are the surveys so important? Well, there are reasons to believe that the Bandwagon effect should be strong in the DR, although I have never seen any evidence that substantiates this. First of all, the DR is a clientelistic society and state. Literally thousands of people are promised jobs by the candidates during the campaign, and the candidates will deliver as best as they can if they win office. If you belong to the winner you increase your chances tremendously of getting a "botella", i.e. a state-job won through clientelism, or being put on the nomina which puts you on the payroll without you having to work; and if you are with the loser you are guaranteed not to get either. If you can demonstrate that during the campaign you worked for the winner, you own a party membership card, and so on, you have a shot. The bandwagon effect could be important for everyone trying to decide the last few months and wants to become active in the campaign with the motive of winning a state job. Second, as mentioned in an earlier blog, there are virtually no ideological differences between the two main parties, which both started out on the left, but are now relatively conservative parties. The less ideology means in an election, the more likely it is that voters may be swayed by other motives, such as a bandwagon effect. Third, many do not want a second round and may vote for the likely winner according to the surveys just to avoid a round number 2 (there is a ballotage if no candidate gets 50%+1 vote in the first round), which is likely to enhance a bandwagon effect.
Most of these surveys cannot be taken seriously, and I do not trust any of these now that election day is getting closer. Historically it is Hamilton and Gallup that have produced the most reliable surveys here, but I have not seen any of these doing surveys in March. In February Hamilton reported that Medina had 50% vs. Mejía's 45% (and given the margin of error that is a technical draw). The latest example of a non-trustworthy survey is the one from the respectable US firm Benenson Strategy group. This is a firm that does surveys, but mainly to be used to provide consults to politicians, find political solutions, etc. See their webpage: http://www.bsgco.com. Benenson reports that Juan Manuel Santos, Barack Obama, UK Labour Party and other prominent politicians are and have been their clients. They sell information to politicians and give politicians advice (a bit like accounting firms/consulting firms doing accounting and consulting for the same companies, recent US history demonstrates that this was a bad combination). So Benenson is a serious firm, but normally hired by politicians for (among other things) survey-based advice, which in the DR context makes them unreliable given that potentially the best advice Benenson could give a candidate is to demonstrate strength in surveys, and then produce this survey.
Anyway, today, April 9, at 10 am Benenson called for a press conference at the relatively new hotel Holiday Inn in the posh area of Lincoln Avenue (fun fact is that while Holiday Inn is a moderately priced hotel/motel in the USA, in the DR Holiday Inn is a luxury, business hotel which is more expensive than the luxurious Inter-Continental hotel in Santo Domingo that belongs to the same chain of hotels). As demonstrated in the graph above, Benenson could report 48% for Medina and 40% for Mejía when all candidates were included; asked about the ticket (but excluding other candidates) 51% for Medina/Cedeño vs. 43% for Mejía/Abinader; it was pointed out that Medina/Cedeño was strong among women (55% vs. 37%); that the majority (51%) thinks Medina will win in the first round; that Mejía has the strongest rejection among voters, 39% say they would never vote for Mejía, only 27% say the same about Medina; that 77% say that the election will be decided in the first round and that among these 77%, 57% think that Danilo Medina will win (39% think Mejía would win); and that 54% were more satisfied with the Fernández government (2004-2012), while 43% less satisfied with the Fernández government compared to the Mejía government (2000-2004).
There are many things to say about the presentation of this survey, all of which convinces me that this survey is ordered by PLD, the Medina (and in particular the Cedeño) faction or companies close to the PLD/Medina/Cedeño. But, first I have to declare that since I was not a journalist I did not receive the CD with the background data material that the survey is based on, I only received the print-out of the PPT slides that the Benenson representatives showed at the press-release. Therefore these comments are based on my impression from that press-conference and from the PPT-slides. Even though I am quite confident that this survey is ordered by the PLD, or indirectly by the PLD, this does not mean that the numbers the survey shows are wrong. On that account I can only say that I have no way of knowing whether they are correct or wrong. Second, according to the PPT-slides the survey is based on 1200 respondents, which should make out a reprentative sample, and the margin is +/- 2.83 points.
There are five elements that convince me the PLD is behind this survey: 1) the questions, which all are centered around what seems to be Danilo Medina's message in this campaign; 2) the slides; 3) the presentation of the slides by Benenson; 4) the fact that Benenson would not say who hired them; 5) the type of firm Benenson is.
1) Danilo has centered his message on several key issues, most of which were covered with questions in this survey. Medina focuses on the fact that he shall win the women, and together with Margarita Cedeño he highlights the women's importance, arguing that Margarita gives Danilo a dimension that Abinader does not give Mejía. Second, as mentioned above as well, Medina argues not only that he will win, he will win in the first round, and that he is the candidate that most people think will win (in addition to being the candidate that most people would vote for). Third, Medina and the PLD works as hard as they can to link Mejía (rightfully) to his disastrous rule in 2000-2004, and that is the worst (and most disliked) politician of this century. Fourth, even though Medina offers slogans of "cambio", it is qualified as "cambio seguro", which points out the insecurity of the erratic Mejía. In addition, Medina points out that he will continue that which is good. All of these elements were covered by questions in the survey. The survey's questions thus fits Medina's message quite well, and as such, works to confirm what Medina is arguing day in and day out to the public. The survey first points out that Danilo is more popular than Mejía, then by adding the vice-presidency to the ticket (and by excluding the rest of the candidates), the survey suggests that Margarita brings more to the table than Abinader (Mejía's vice-presidential candidate), which is victory in the first round for Medina. Then it looks at gender-support for the ticket, demonstrating strong female support for Medina/Cedeño, before it builds on Medina's message that people no matter what they vote, think that he will win, and with another question asking the ones who knows who to vote for whether they think it will be decided in the first round and who they think will win (yes, Medina). Finally, supporting Medina's message of "cambio seguro" and continue what is good, it looks at the rejection rate of the candidates and compares Fernández with Medina. The questions (and sum of answers) all fit Medina's message too well.
All of this is done quite well, and are relatively weak circumstantial evidence for my hypothesis. Therefore, I turn the attention to the slides which includes a couple of, maybe, equally weak circumstantial evidence (the reader will have to judge this). First of all, the slides highlights Medina's positive results through headings, everything in the text is written as to underscore the strength of Medina instead of presenting dull, statistical survey results, and to convince us that Medina will win in the first round. Only Medina is mentioned in headings with one exception to highlight Mejía's high rejection percentage. Second, as a consequence of the first point, Mejía's name is almost never mentioned, all is about Medina and Margarita Cedeño, and strangely enough Margarita Cedeño is always mentioned with first and last name, Medina only with first name (is it because she is a woman?, or is there some other reason?). 3) On the gender-based breakdown of support for the candidates, the slide highlights and circles how more women than men support Medina, it does not highlight that more men than women support Mejía. Granted, this difference is smaller, but could have been mentioned. All in all, the slides seem created to convince that Medina is the sure bet, which fits well with a theory that you believe the bandwagon-effect is important.
The presentation in itself also supports, in my view, the tendencies I note above. The oral presentation seemed to aim to convince us Medina would win. But, given the fact that these guys are professional survey analysts, some strange corners were cut in the presentation (and on the slides) that made Medina look better. First is the strange assessment by the presenter (who I think was Giancarlo Sopo, but I am not sure, I arrived a bit late) that when including Cedeño in the question the survey demonstrates Medina would win in the first round (and implying her importance being greater than Abinader's). This is basically a white lie given the fact that this question only asked about preference of the two main tickets Medina/Cedeño and Mejía/Abinader and excluded the smaller parties. Therefore Medina reached the 50% threshold, it was not because Cedeño was added. In fact Benenson's own numbers give Medina a three point increase when adding Cedeño to the question (and excluding all minor parties/candidates), but the same is the result for Mejía/Abinader. Also, the oral presentation highlighted all the positive numbers for Medina/Cedeño and highlighted any negative numbers for Mejía without any caveats. Again, I repeat myself, my impression is that the presentation was made to convince us that Medina would win, not to present dry results.
When asked by a journalist who had commissioned this survey, Benenson answered "a group of private companies" whose identity they could not disclose. This is probably true. A group of companies may have paid for this on a promise of anonymity. For all we know these companies might be owned by Félix Bautista (see my previous blog). However, given this fact, I do not trust the survey. Surveys may be manipulated and I see no valid reason why some companies, whichever they are, should want to hide themselves if they order a survey done. Of the surveys listed above, we know who ordered one of seven. This is the one ordered by Diario Libre, and in my view is the most reliable of the ones I have registered in March (but a source in the PLD tells me that these figures were fixed before published in the Diario Libre...if that is true, I do not know, but what is clear is that Diario Libre did what they could to present Mejía in a positive light in their presentation of that survey, and that on the second day of releasing results from the survey it became clear that Mejía's lead over Medina was somewhat more qualified than what was presented the first day). Given the fact that the DR is a democracy, albeit imperfect, there is no reason to hold back who orders a survey unless you want to hide that it may have been ordered for political reasons (which I believe is the case here).
Finally, Benenson lives of giving advice to politicians and uses surveys to do so. The use of surveys is used to fine-tune politicians' message, not to report results and inform the public. Therefore I am not surprised that the questions fit Medina's message so well (this, however, is no reason for the survey company to cheat with the survey, but many results can be created by the formulation of questions, etc). Benenson in fact brags in their webpages of all the politicians they have worked for (and they are mostly politicians...can the PLD be considered a private company?), why would they suddenly want to keep this a secret now. It could be nice for Benenson to have the PLD and Leonel Fernández as clients. Fernández holds a very good name in Latin America, why not put that on their webpage? I believe this survey is made with the purpose of giving advice to Medina and Cedeño, which is what Benenson does. It is therefore not an objective survey, and I do not trust its results. It may be that the correct figures are presented, or it might be that the correct figures are only presented to the candidates to fine-tune the message, and that Benenson gave advice to "juice" the official stats to win more support. We cannot know. I can basically see no reason for why Benenson would harm their name in producing bad surveys, but then again, they will do what is best for whoever contracts them. If the presented results are false, I presume the candidates have seen the correct results. The only motive for not presenting the correct results must be the fear of not getting a contract renewal for another survey if the results are bad for the candidate. But, as mentioned, I have not seen the data material and cannot say anything about the veracity of the results presented. What I do think I have argued well for is that Benenson's message seemed like ordered by the PLD: The questions, the slides and the presentation fit Medina's message extremely well, they seem created to convince the public that Medina is a sure bet, and therefore seem biased and non-trustworthy.
I must finally add that this long story of a survey which I think is paid for by the PLD or companies that support the PLD, is only one of probably many such examples in this (and previous) campaigns. I will probably not write extensively about other politicised surveys, but I want to add that this could just as well have been a story about a survey ordered by the PRD. I happened to write about this one since I had the opportunity to go to this press-conference.
Monday, 26 March 2012
Monday March 26...in Santo Domingo
Some of the posts I put out will be more of a diary type and shortly summarise some of the last events of the elections and politics more in general. This is one of these posts.
Yesterday was an important date for the elections since the Junta Central Electoral (www.jce.do) officially accepted the candidacies for president and vice president, and started verifying the electoral roll (census of registered voters). PLD runs with Danilo Medina and Margarita Cedeño, PRD with Hipólito Mejía and Luis Abinader, and PRSC will not have a proper candidate but supports officially Danilo Medina (you can actually vote for Medina on a PRSC ticket on May 20). There are four more groups of candidates from minor parties (if parties is the proper name for any of the political parties in the country right now): Eduardo Estrella for DxC (Dominicanos por el Cambio), Estrella from Cibao was presidential candidate for the PRSC in 2004, in 2008 he ran as presidential candidate for PRSD (Partido Revolucionario Social Demócrata, Hatuey DeCamps splinter party from the PRD...interestingly after a deal PRSD will this year support Mejía and the PRD and DeCamps has become one of Mejía's campaign managers...evil tongues have it that DeCamps does this only to bury Mejía as a revenge against Mejía running for re-election in 2004). This is therefore Estrella's third bid for the presidency, for his third party, in eight years. Max Puig is the presidential candidate for Alianza por la democracia, APD, a party he founded when he officially left the PLD. Puig was as recently as 2004 named environmental minister by Fernández, and until recently his party has supported and allied with the PLD. The real "independent candidate" this year, and one who might be popular with the middle classes who are tired of the same old from the established parties, is Guillermo Moreno for the party Alianza País. Moreno is a lawyer, a popular education among Dominican politicians and he has earlier worked as an academic, lawyer and as prosecutor general in Santo Domingo. Earlier he has represented MIUCA (Movimiento Independencia Unidad y Cambio), which used to play the role as the intelectual alternative to the major parties but this year supports Julian Serrulle (see below). If Moreno can capture enough votes of the people who are "jarto", then there might be a second round in the presidential elections. The last candidate is Julian Serrulle for the Frente Amplio party. Serrulle comes from a well-known political family as well and just as Max Puig he considered himself close to Juan Bosch, and the PLD. In sum we have the two main candidates, two independent candidates that come out of the PLD, one from the PRSC and one which has very little history with the main parties.
JCE also started revising the electoral roll, which means checking that all with a right to vote is registered as a voter and registered at a polling station that enables voting. Historically, the electoral roll (padrón electoral) has been the source of electoral fraud in the country, most famously in 1994 with the displacement of up to 300.000 voters, but this year I do not think one should expect any greater problems. The OAS has been present to oversee the revision, but the PRD (just to be sure) is on top of the process and is complaining that their voters (in particular) may be displaced. There has been a few reasons for concern regarding the Center for computing in the JCE, partly because both in the Center and the JCE key members are considered to be too closely associated with the PLD. Since this promises to be a close election, such concerns should be taken seriously.
On another note, today Diario Libre ran a story that nicely demonstrates the workings of a clientelistic state. The DR political culture and regime must be caracterised as clientelistic, and Hartlyn in his 1998 book called the regime neopatrimonial. This is a description that still fits today. Diario Libre could report that 80% of the vice-ministers (sub-secretary of state) are inorganic, which means that they are not nominated by law. It also means that these do not do any work for the state, they only receive a salary. Most of these do not even have an office. In total Diario Libre found that only 36 vice-ministers are nominated according to the law and potentially do any real work for the government. 154 vice-ministers are not nominated according to the law and probably do not do anything for the government, except receive a salary, potentially a car and maybe some funds for private security, etc. There are 20 ministries in the country, so the total sum of 190 vice-ministers is quite high. The PRD economist, or economist with a known affiliation with the PRD, Andrés Dauhajre Jr. came to an even higher figure last year. He argues that there are 334 vice-ministers in the country. The actual minister of Public Administration, Ramón Ventura, reports that his ministry has produced regulations of the nomination of vice-ministers, and he has given his colleagues until June to remove any superfluous vice-ministers. My guess is that this regulation will not be respected and that things will continue like they are even after the elections. The reason is that vice-ministries are currency for alliances (together with among other things the presidency of the Liga Municipal Dominicana), and these are as important as ever given that ideological differences are almost non-existent between the main parties (this is confirmed by the Elite surveys done by the Universidad de Salamanca). Supporting the two top candidates are for the PLD: PRSC, BIS (former Peña Gómez, PRD, faction), UDC (Unión Demócrata Cristiana), Partido Quiqueyano Demócrata Cristiano, FNP (Fuerza Nacional Progresista), Partido de los Trabajadores Dominicanos (PTD), Partido Popular Cristiano, Partido Demócrata Popular, Partido Cívico Renovador, Partido Liberal de la República Dominicana, Partido de Acción Liberal (PAL), Partido Socialista Verde and Partido de la Unidad Nacional. Supporting the PRD we find the former splinter party PRSD, Partido Demócrata Institucional, Partido Movimiento Democrático Alternativo, Partido Humanista Dominicano and Partio Alianza Social Dominicana. All in all 18 parties, which are not really parties, but entities of electoral accountability that helps the main party keep scores of how many votes the minor parties contributed with in their victory. From that score, once in government, a president may start paying out. And, they pay out with vice-ministries.
A last funny note was a letter of opinion written in Hoy on March 23 by Ramón Arturo Guerrero, which compared Leonel Fernández with President-elect Putin of Russia. I expected a nice story about how Medina would be for Leonel what Medvedev was to Putin, but no. It was a piece comparing their backgrounds growing up in authoritarian systems, education, etc. and which compared their popularity. Both leaders, Guerrero argued, implemented democracy in their respective countries and ruled with high quality. Guerrero concludes that Fernández as Putin, could come back in 2016 (and for some reason be re-elected in 2020, apparently Guerrero assumes that someone will reform the constitution again and open for immediate presidential re-election, again). Although I am critical to President Fernández's work as president, I must say that he strikes as somewhat more democratic than Putin. Guerrero, who obviously is a Fernández supporter, did not make a very flattering comparison for his president.
Yesterday was an important date for the elections since the Junta Central Electoral (www.jce.do) officially accepted the candidacies for president and vice president, and started verifying the electoral roll (census of registered voters). PLD runs with Danilo Medina and Margarita Cedeño, PRD with Hipólito Mejía and Luis Abinader, and PRSC will not have a proper candidate but supports officially Danilo Medina (you can actually vote for Medina on a PRSC ticket on May 20). There are four more groups of candidates from minor parties (if parties is the proper name for any of the political parties in the country right now): Eduardo Estrella for DxC (Dominicanos por el Cambio), Estrella from Cibao was presidential candidate for the PRSC in 2004, in 2008 he ran as presidential candidate for PRSD (Partido Revolucionario Social Demócrata, Hatuey DeCamps splinter party from the PRD...interestingly after a deal PRSD will this year support Mejía and the PRD and DeCamps has become one of Mejía's campaign managers...evil tongues have it that DeCamps does this only to bury Mejía as a revenge against Mejía running for re-election in 2004). This is therefore Estrella's third bid for the presidency, for his third party, in eight years. Max Puig is the presidential candidate for Alianza por la democracia, APD, a party he founded when he officially left the PLD. Puig was as recently as 2004 named environmental minister by Fernández, and until recently his party has supported and allied with the PLD. The real "independent candidate" this year, and one who might be popular with the middle classes who are tired of the same old from the established parties, is Guillermo Moreno for the party Alianza País. Moreno is a lawyer, a popular education among Dominican politicians and he has earlier worked as an academic, lawyer and as prosecutor general in Santo Domingo. Earlier he has represented MIUCA (Movimiento Independencia Unidad y Cambio), which used to play the role as the intelectual alternative to the major parties but this year supports Julian Serrulle (see below). If Moreno can capture enough votes of the people who are "jarto", then there might be a second round in the presidential elections. The last candidate is Julian Serrulle for the Frente Amplio party. Serrulle comes from a well-known political family as well and just as Max Puig he considered himself close to Juan Bosch, and the PLD. In sum we have the two main candidates, two independent candidates that come out of the PLD, one from the PRSC and one which has very little history with the main parties.
JCE also started revising the electoral roll, which means checking that all with a right to vote is registered as a voter and registered at a polling station that enables voting. Historically, the electoral roll (padrón electoral) has been the source of electoral fraud in the country, most famously in 1994 with the displacement of up to 300.000 voters, but this year I do not think one should expect any greater problems. The OAS has been present to oversee the revision, but the PRD (just to be sure) is on top of the process and is complaining that their voters (in particular) may be displaced. There has been a few reasons for concern regarding the Center for computing in the JCE, partly because both in the Center and the JCE key members are considered to be too closely associated with the PLD. Since this promises to be a close election, such concerns should be taken seriously.
On another note, today Diario Libre ran a story that nicely demonstrates the workings of a clientelistic state. The DR political culture and regime must be caracterised as clientelistic, and Hartlyn in his 1998 book called the regime neopatrimonial. This is a description that still fits today. Diario Libre could report that 80% of the vice-ministers (sub-secretary of state) are inorganic, which means that they are not nominated by law. It also means that these do not do any work for the state, they only receive a salary. Most of these do not even have an office. In total Diario Libre found that only 36 vice-ministers are nominated according to the law and potentially do any real work for the government. 154 vice-ministers are not nominated according to the law and probably do not do anything for the government, except receive a salary, potentially a car and maybe some funds for private security, etc. There are 20 ministries in the country, so the total sum of 190 vice-ministers is quite high. The PRD economist, or economist with a known affiliation with the PRD, Andrés Dauhajre Jr. came to an even higher figure last year. He argues that there are 334 vice-ministers in the country. The actual minister of Public Administration, Ramón Ventura, reports that his ministry has produced regulations of the nomination of vice-ministers, and he has given his colleagues until June to remove any superfluous vice-ministers. My guess is that this regulation will not be respected and that things will continue like they are even after the elections. The reason is that vice-ministries are currency for alliances (together with among other things the presidency of the Liga Municipal Dominicana), and these are as important as ever given that ideological differences are almost non-existent between the main parties (this is confirmed by the Elite surveys done by the Universidad de Salamanca). Supporting the two top candidates are for the PLD: PRSC, BIS (former Peña Gómez, PRD, faction), UDC (Unión Demócrata Cristiana), Partido Quiqueyano Demócrata Cristiano, FNP (Fuerza Nacional Progresista), Partido de los Trabajadores Dominicanos (PTD), Partido Popular Cristiano, Partido Demócrata Popular, Partido Cívico Renovador, Partido Liberal de la República Dominicana, Partido de Acción Liberal (PAL), Partido Socialista Verde and Partido de la Unidad Nacional. Supporting the PRD we find the former splinter party PRSD, Partido Demócrata Institucional, Partido Movimiento Democrático Alternativo, Partido Humanista Dominicano and Partio Alianza Social Dominicana. All in all 18 parties, which are not really parties, but entities of electoral accountability that helps the main party keep scores of how many votes the minor parties contributed with in their victory. From that score, once in government, a president may start paying out. And, they pay out with vice-ministries.
A last funny note was a letter of opinion written in Hoy on March 23 by Ramón Arturo Guerrero, which compared Leonel Fernández with President-elect Putin of Russia. I expected a nice story about how Medina would be for Leonel what Medvedev was to Putin, but no. It was a piece comparing their backgrounds growing up in authoritarian systems, education, etc. and which compared their popularity. Both leaders, Guerrero argued, implemented democracy in their respective countries and ruled with high quality. Guerrero concludes that Fernández as Putin, could come back in 2016 (and for some reason be re-elected in 2020, apparently Guerrero assumes that someone will reform the constitution again and open for immediate presidential re-election, again). Although I am critical to President Fernández's work as president, I must say that he strikes as somewhat more democratic than Putin. Guerrero, who obviously is a Fernández supporter, did not make a very flattering comparison for his president.
Sunday, 25 March 2012
The battle over education in the DR
(One has to be careful when using blogger on Iphone...I accidentally deleted this blog from March 25, and repost it now)
A bit more than a year ago, the DR suddenlyexperienced one of its first modern collective, civil-society mobilisations,and it articulated demands for better quality in the education system in thecountry. The protests hit President Leonel Fernández quite hard and the size,level of uproar and level of mobilisation was a surprise, I think, both to thegovernment and everyone else.
To almost everyone's disappointment, Leonel presented a budget for 2011 (andlater for 2012) that did not increase the funds for education, and Congress passed a law that basically gave President Fernández the right to violate the 66/97 education law and spend less than that law stipulated on education. Leonel thus presenteda budget that maintained funding for education stable at about 1.8% of GDP. Theprotests, however, together with an internal dissent in the PLD led Congress toincrease funds for education about 4,000 million DOP, which could beinterpreted as a victory (albeit a small one) for the opposition and the 4%group. This of course was old news until FLACSO (Facultad Latinoamericano de Ciencias Sociales) and others decided to follow up the government's effort ineducation. A recent report by FLACSO picked up by Diario Libre, Hoy and othernews media, demonstrated that the ministry of education spent 6,788 million DOPless than budgeted by congress. The ministry thus spent less than theadministration had originally proposed in the budget. In fact the ministryspent only about 85% of what was budgeted after Congress's increase of about4,000 million DOP. The renowned journalist Juan Bolívar Díaz called it "Otra burla a la voluntad popular" in the newspaper Hoy on Sunday, March 25.
A bit more than a year ago, the DR suddenlyexperienced one of its first modern collective, civil-society mobilisations,and it articulated demands for better quality in the education system in thecountry. The protests hit President Leonel Fernández quite hard and the size,level of uproar and level of mobilisation was a surprise, I think, both to thegovernment and everyone else.
The demands were for the government to comply with law 66/97 that stipulates that the education ministry shouldreceive funds equivalent to 4% of the country's GDP. The law was passed duringLeonel's first government, but with the votes also from the opposition (PRD).Anyway, since 1997 the governments have never met this target, and the fundsgiven to education has lingered between 1.5-1.8% of GDP since 1998. Obviously,all three Fernández administrations and the Mejía administration violated theeducation law.
Last year groups mainly from the middleclass organised rather spontaneously and using new social networks to demandthat the government comply with the law of education and spend 4% of GDP oneducation. The group used yellow as its colour and the message was simple (as it was unrealistic): Idemand 4%. Leonel's nice rhetoric finally met with the hard realities and thetwo did not match up. The organisers of the 4% actions were so succesful thatthe government became rather desperate. Suddenly people wearing yellow t-shirts were denied access to the cathedral, national monuments and other publicplaces. (the serious) Parts of Leonel's own party started demanding that forthe 2011 budget the President should correct former wrongs and add more fundsto education. The opposition of course was also demanding (suddenly) more fundsfor education, even though in all previous years the PRD and PRSC had remainedrelatively silent on the subject. The whole debacle was an interestingdemonstration of civil society mobilisation moving setting the agenda andcreating sufficient momentum to actually achieve positive results. I wasactually quite impressed since this does not occur frequently in the DR (exceptfor taxi drivers and transporters' strikes which generally achieve their goals).
To almost everyone's disappointment, Leonel presented a budget for 2011 (andlater for 2012) that did not increase the funds for education, and Congress passed a law that basically gave President Fernández the right to violate the 66/97 education law and spend less than that law stipulated on education. Leonel thus presenteda budget that maintained funding for education stable at about 1.8% of GDP. Theprotests, however, together with an internal dissent in the PLD led Congress toincrease funds for education about 4,000 million DOP, which could beinterpreted as a victory (albeit a small one) for the opposition and the 4%group. This of course was old news until FLACSO (Facultad Latinoamericano de Ciencias Sociales) and others decided to follow up the government's effort ineducation. A recent report by FLACSO picked up by Diario Libre, Hoy and othernews media, demonstrated that the ministry of education spent 6,788 million DOPless than budgeted by congress. The ministry thus spent less than theadministration had originally proposed in the budget. In fact the ministryspent only about 85% of what was budgeted after Congress's increase of about4,000 million DOP. The renowned journalist Juan Bolívar Díaz called it "Otra burla a la voluntad popular" in the newspaper Hoy on Sunday, March 25.
This news has come back to haunt the PLDgovernment led by Leonel Fernández, himself an educated, and intellectual,president, who one would think, believing in his speeches, would supporteducation. The story became big news both in Diario Libre, Acento and Hoy. My research, however, demonstrates that the recent negligence ineducation, and the recent under-spending, is not new, but rather follows up along-held legacy since Balaguer's 12 años (1966-1978) (for more, see for instance my Master's thesis and my article in ALH.
The graph above shows spending compared to passed budget in the ministry of education from 1966-2009 (data based on official proposed budget and executed budget). Basically the graph demonstrates that it is quite normal that DR administrations spend less money on education than what is originally budgeted. In fact from 1966-2009, on average only 87% of the budget was spent by the ministry of education. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that the ministry of education only managed to spend 85% of its budgeted funds in 2011. The graph, however, also demonstrates that the trend is that governments in the DR are improving. Starting out at about 80% of spent allocations, the ministry of education today is spending on average more than 90% of its funds. This indeed, is a positive development, even though it has taken more than forty years...
But, how much do Dominican governments spend on education? Generally the country score extremely low in Latin American comparisons. The following graph tracks the percentage of all budget expenses that goes to education in the same 1966-2009 period.
Now, beware that this is percentage of all budget expenses, not percentage of GDP which the big 4% debate is about. The graph demonstrates first that as share of all budget expenses became less important as the Balaguer administrations (1966-1978, 1986-1990) progressed, and that education received its lowest share of the budget during the Balaguer regimes. Furthermore, the administrations that took over after Balaguer (PRD 1978, PLD in 1996) increased drastically education's share of total budget expenses. However, under both PRD's first and second stint in power (1992-86, 2000-04), education lost importance with time, in both periods maybe due to the on-going economic hardship that hit the PRD administrations. After Mejía left power in 2004, Fernández's administrations did not increase spending to education, and the budgets have stabilised about 8-10% of all budget expenses. But, how much do Dominican governments spend on education? Generally the country score extremely low in Latin American comparisons. The following graph tracks the percentage of all budget expenses that goes to education in the same 1966-2009 period.
What can we conclude: All administrations do not pay sufficient attention to education in the DR, all administration tend to give less money than budgeted to education, a fact that makes matters worse, and all administrations since 1997 have broken the law (and some might say the constitution). There is therefore good reasons to be sceptical towards the candidates' promises of 4% to education. Regardless of this it is also important that the well-intentioned groups fighting for the 4% target accept compromises along the road since doubling the education ministry's budget would not bevery fruitful. The education ministry would probably not know how to tackle so much funds and it would only open up for more corruption. What one could hope for is stable increases in the budget share for education so that in maybe 10 years the country might reach the target established by law. The great disappointment for the Dominicans should be that this development never started in 1998.
Thursday, 22 March 2012
Welcome to my blog
This is the first, short post in my newly created blog on Dominican politics, and in particular the Dominican 2012 presidential elections, which I will be following "on site" in Santo Domingo from now and until May 20.
I will try to sum up and analyse important events during the campaign and maybe also draw some lines between the current campaign and recent political history in the country.
Currently the election campaign is heating up and there are basically too many things going on for me to capture every detail. Some of the issues I do want to focus on in the days and weeks to come, however, are the candidates: Danilo Medina and Hipólito Mejía for the PLD (Partido de la Liberación Dominicana) and PRD (Partido de la Revolución Dominicana), respectively, who both ran as presidential candidates in 2000 when Mejía ; the party system and main political parties (PLD, PRD and the rests of the split PRSC); the scandals and more than anything else the corruption allegations; connected to this I hope to get time to write on the so-called Margaritagate which included allegations that the current First Lady and candidate for the Vice-Presidency for PLD, Margarita Cedeño, had a bank-account in Denmark with 43 million €; Felix Bautista, the strong-man, Leonel's protegé and friend, and PLD-senator who has been involved in corruption schemes earlier and now may be one of the reasons for the recent change of Prime Minister in Haiti; current President Leonel Fernández merits some words, already president for twelve years and younger than Balaguer was before he started his "doce años" in 1966; another very interesting topic is the war of the surveys in the campaign and how these are used by the candidates; the political party alliances and the minor parties; the father and son party FNP (Fuerza Nacional Progresista) that has supported the PLD since 1996 in a xenophobic alliance; and the message (or lack thereof) of the candidates in this campaign.
These are only some topics that I hope to start blogging about already tomorrow.
As a short intro I can say that the presidential elections for 2012 will be a battle between two candidates, PLD's Danilo Medina who picked the first lady Margarita Cedeño as his vice-presidential candidate, and PRD's Hipólito Mejía who picked Luis Abinader from a traditional PRD family as his vice-presidential candidate. It will be a very tight race and there are two uncertainties going on at the moment: Who will win? And, will there be a need for a second electoral round? In the DR there is a ballotage if the leading candidate does not obtain at least 50% of the votes in the first round. This rule was implemented for the 1996 presidential election, and this year was the only year that a second round was needed (Leonel Fernández beat José Francisco Peña Gómez, PRD, in the second round). In 2000 Hipólito Mejía was very close to reaching 50% of the votes in the first round, and after presidential candidate Balaguer, PRSC, had said there wouldn't be any need for a second round, Mejía was declared the winner. In the 2004 and 2008 Fernández obtained more than 50% of the votes in the first round in two-horse races against Hipólito Mejía and Miguel Vargas (PRD). Whether there will be a second round or not this time, depends on how many votes the minor parties can catch and the closeness of the race among the two main contenders. The PRSC this year has basically decided to retire its own party, now controlled by Foreign Minister Carlos Morales Troncoso, and supports Medina in this race.
Up until recently my money would have been on Hipólito Mejía and the PRD. First because I think many are tired of the PLD rule and the great difference between Leonel's rhetoric and socio-economic realities. Second, sufficent new voters have been enrolled and sufficient older voters have forgotten that between 2000-2004 Hipólito Mejía most likely was the worst president (at least in economic terms) since the start of democracy in 1978. Three, Medina is not a very popular candidate outside the PLD-organisation. The last couple of months I have started slowly to change my mind since Margarita gives Medina access to state resources during the campaign, and she lets him get a hold on Leonel followers. This might be enough to get him elected. I think a Medina victory might be good for democracy in the country because it would weaken somewhat Leonel's hold on the PLD and open that party up, and the PRD might have to get some new and younger blood into the leadership of the party. A Mejía victory might be bad for the country if he rules like he did last time, and it would strengthen both Leonel and Mejía's position in their respective parties. On the other hand, a change in government after 8 years of PLD might be even more important for the country's democracy, but if this happens it is a bit sad that presidency will be handed over to a "devil we know" (to cite political scientist Javier Corrales).
Hopefully we will know on May 20 who wins, and then we will know if Hartlyn's hypothesis from his 1998 book that the tighter the election the higher risk for an electoral crisis, is correct. Although I hope that an electoral crisis will be avoided in this presumably tight election, I do think that the tighter the election result the more advantegous for the incumbent party. Luckily the Junta Central Electoral is a much more professional electoral organiser now than in 1994, although it seems somewhat more politicised (and PLD) dominated than before.
I will try to sum up and analyse important events during the campaign and maybe also draw some lines between the current campaign and recent political history in the country.
Currently the election campaign is heating up and there are basically too many things going on for me to capture every detail. Some of the issues I do want to focus on in the days and weeks to come, however, are the candidates: Danilo Medina and Hipólito Mejía for the PLD (Partido de la Liberación Dominicana) and PRD (Partido de la Revolución Dominicana), respectively, who both ran as presidential candidates in 2000 when Mejía ; the party system and main political parties (PLD, PRD and the rests of the split PRSC); the scandals and more than anything else the corruption allegations; connected to this I hope to get time to write on the so-called Margaritagate which included allegations that the current First Lady and candidate for the Vice-Presidency for PLD, Margarita Cedeño, had a bank-account in Denmark with 43 million €; Felix Bautista, the strong-man, Leonel's protegé and friend, and PLD-senator who has been involved in corruption schemes earlier and now may be one of the reasons for the recent change of Prime Minister in Haiti; current President Leonel Fernández merits some words, already president for twelve years and younger than Balaguer was before he started his "doce años" in 1966; another very interesting topic is the war of the surveys in the campaign and how these are used by the candidates; the political party alliances and the minor parties; the father and son party FNP (Fuerza Nacional Progresista) that has supported the PLD since 1996 in a xenophobic alliance; and the message (or lack thereof) of the candidates in this campaign.
These are only some topics that I hope to start blogging about already tomorrow.
As a short intro I can say that the presidential elections for 2012 will be a battle between two candidates, PLD's Danilo Medina who picked the first lady Margarita Cedeño as his vice-presidential candidate, and PRD's Hipólito Mejía who picked Luis Abinader from a traditional PRD family as his vice-presidential candidate. It will be a very tight race and there are two uncertainties going on at the moment: Who will win? And, will there be a need for a second electoral round? In the DR there is a ballotage if the leading candidate does not obtain at least 50% of the votes in the first round. This rule was implemented for the 1996 presidential election, and this year was the only year that a second round was needed (Leonel Fernández beat José Francisco Peña Gómez, PRD, in the second round). In 2000 Hipólito Mejía was very close to reaching 50% of the votes in the first round, and after presidential candidate Balaguer, PRSC, had said there wouldn't be any need for a second round, Mejía was declared the winner. In the 2004 and 2008 Fernández obtained more than 50% of the votes in the first round in two-horse races against Hipólito Mejía and Miguel Vargas (PRD). Whether there will be a second round or not this time, depends on how many votes the minor parties can catch and the closeness of the race among the two main contenders. The PRSC this year has basically decided to retire its own party, now controlled by Foreign Minister Carlos Morales Troncoso, and supports Medina in this race.
Up until recently my money would have been on Hipólito Mejía and the PRD. First because I think many are tired of the PLD rule and the great difference between Leonel's rhetoric and socio-economic realities. Second, sufficent new voters have been enrolled and sufficient older voters have forgotten that between 2000-2004 Hipólito Mejía most likely was the worst president (at least in economic terms) since the start of democracy in 1978. Three, Medina is not a very popular candidate outside the PLD-organisation. The last couple of months I have started slowly to change my mind since Margarita gives Medina access to state resources during the campaign, and she lets him get a hold on Leonel followers. This might be enough to get him elected. I think a Medina victory might be good for democracy in the country because it would weaken somewhat Leonel's hold on the PLD and open that party up, and the PRD might have to get some new and younger blood into the leadership of the party. A Mejía victory might be bad for the country if he rules like he did last time, and it would strengthen both Leonel and Mejía's position in their respective parties. On the other hand, a change in government after 8 years of PLD might be even more important for the country's democracy, but if this happens it is a bit sad that presidency will be handed over to a "devil we know" (to cite political scientist Javier Corrales).
Hopefully we will know on May 20 who wins, and then we will know if Hartlyn's hypothesis from his 1998 book that the tighter the election the higher risk for an electoral crisis, is correct. Although I hope that an electoral crisis will be avoided in this presumably tight election, I do think that the tighter the election result the more advantegous for the incumbent party. Luckily the Junta Central Electoral is a much more professional electoral organiser now than in 1994, although it seems somewhat more politicised (and PLD) dominated than before.
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