Santo Domingo.– The Chamber of Deputies accepted the report that favored approval as presented by the head of the Budget Commission, Jose Cabrera, who requested that the legislation be treated with urgency. According to the report, US$137 million would be used for the electric sector for the rest of the year.

The objective of the government in its negotiations of a Stand By Agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Cabrera explained, is to unblock the disbursements and obtain fresh resources from multilateral financial organizations that will allow the government to compensate for the reduction of fiscal income.

After two consecutive readings, the Chamber of Deputies declared the measure to be urgent and approved the proposal that modified the Law of Expenditures for this year and increased the budget from RD$328.9 billion to RD$337.1 billion, of which RD$6.32 billion will go to cover financial applications referred from the 2008 debt, above all, to the electric sector.

The budget modification implies an increase of RD$8.088 billion of which RD$5.0 billion will go to the Dominican Corporation of State-owned Electricity Enterprises (CDEEE), and RD$640 million to the Dominican Social Security Institute.