SANTO DOMINGO.- Three ruling PLD Party deputies and one of the opposition PRSC on Wednesday warned president Leonel Fernandez to be on the alert to the sale of government lands to individuals at the price of a “dead cow.”

The warning comes just one day after an associate of Chamber president Julio Cesar Valentin was arrested in Santiago on charges of Customs fraud, and the lates scandal signals the return of the “hombre del maletin” (bagman) to the corridors of Congress.

Juan Quiñones, Gustavo Sanchez Manuel Diaz, of the PLD and Frank Martinez of the PRSC accuse the State Sugar Council (CEA) of selling State-owned lands at “vile” prices, disregarding the negative repercussions against the government and the taxpayers.

The three PLD deputies together with other party colleagues forced the abrupt close of Tuesday’s session of the Chamber, after calling “leonine” the contract to sell the nearly 14 million square meters of land in Sabana Grande de Boya (east) to the mogul Ramon Rizek Llabali for RD$36.4 million.

Their angry protest forced the suspension of the session by abstaining from voting on the piece and breaking the quorum, for which Valentin sent the contract to Commission and pledged to publish the contract in the media.

The lands correspond to the sugar mill Haina River, of the CEA, which Quiñones and Sanchez affirm are worth more than 80 million pesos, “and we are giving them away at the price of a dead cow and that must end.”

Quiñones emphasized that rivers and little streams border the 22 thousand tasks that the State would sell the family Rizek Llabali.

“I’ve been warning of the nonsense in the CEA to grab up public property for a long time,” said Diaz (PLD-Villa Altagracia).

Chamber Finance Commission president Marino Collante also slammed the proposed sale, calling it detrimental because in his view the land is worth more than 70 billion pesos. He said the contract establishes a RD$10 million down payment and the remaining 26 million in annual quotas for 20 years. “That cannot be.”