Calling the kettle black: Top Dominican official slams the US envoy

Santo Domingo..- The cofounder and senior leader of Dominican Republic’s ruling party (PLD) on Tuesday railed against US ambassador James W. Brewster, who last week criticized what he considered government corruption and urged Dominican society to fight it.

Euclides Gutierrez, who is also the Superintendent of Insurance, said Brewster’s statements should carefully mulled because in his view, "it’s a plan which will reach further" and targets former president Leonel Fernández and the PLD.

He said the US envoys’ statements go in the same direction as the allegations of corruption voiced against himself and other PLD leaders, and presumably seek to harm Fernández.

In his recent column published by the daily El Nacional titled ‘Watch out!’ the senior politico writes:

“The author of this column ignores how far a representative, of diplomatic investiture, of the government of the United States, can openly and aggressively interferers in the domestic politics of a country, anywhere in the world other than the Dominican Republic.”

“Now, recently, at the monthly luncheon sponsored by the American Chamber of Commerce, the highest-ranking representative of the US diplomatic mission in our country, urged businessmen and personalities present at the event, to confront the "public and private" corruption which affects Dominican society and that has spread and deepened in the last twenty years, including at that time, the administrations of Dominican Liberation Party, three of which have been chaired by the colleague Leonel Fernandez Reyna.”

“More than ten years ago the writer of this column publicly stated that in the governments of the PLD… corruption was detected executed by peers who held various administrative functions of ministries and state agencies."

“The statement and the calling by this gentleman draws attention, because we are convinced that no official of that category would dare make statements of this magnitude, if not expressly authorized to speak with candor, divested of all respect.”

Fallen from grace

Once respected as a keen historian and author, Gutierrez has recently fallen from grace for his questioned handling of the embezzlement case of the insurance giant SEGNA, which prompted newspaper Diario Libre to file charges of violation of the freedom of information law, and the collapse of the Bank Peravia, which dragged the major insurance company Union de Seguros with it.