dominican parks under tourism attack

> SOURCE: DR1 Daily News -- Monday, 5 March 2001 www.dr1.com
> ********************************************************************
>
>
> National Park of the Este controversy
> President Hipólito Mejia, admitting that a decree cannot modify a law,
> corrected his error in January, as newspaper reports revealed over the
> weekend. Reportedly, he sent to the Senate on 23 January a law that
> gives legality to what he proposes in two earlier decrees. The subject
> of controversy is the separation of an area of the National Park of
> the East for hotel development. Ecologists and hotel operators in the
> area have protested the separation of the two beach portions (20A and
> 24A) for their reported future sale to an Air Europa affiliate for the
> construction of 1,200 hotel rooms. The construction of the hotel is
> protested on grounds that it would affect the fragile bird and fauna
> breeding areas of Bayahibe (24 hectares) and La Magdalena (415
> hectares) in the province of La Altagracia and the cave of Jose Maria
> with its 1,200 pre-Columbus time pictographs. The Park of the East
> dates back to 1975 and was reaffirmed by President Mejía government
> only two days after entering office with Environmental Law 64-00 of 18
> August 2000. But now President Mejia favors the development of the
> areas on grounds that tourism development is compatible with the
> ecology. "You can have mountains, rivers and hotels, but we do nothing
> having Indian pictographs in a cave if tourists do not visit the
> cave," said Mejia. Mejia has been enfatic that tourism development is
> a priority of his administration. The January bill incorporates the
> content of decrees 657-00 of 30 August 2000 and 7 November 2000, which
> could be contested for lack of legality. News sources say that the
> Ministry of Environment was not consulted prior to issuing the
> decrees. The Senate announced that the bill will be studied on
> Wednesday. Probably at that time the opinion of the Ministry of
> Environment will be heard. In addition to opposition by ecologists and
> hotel operators in the area, the owners of adjacent property that
> continues to be part of the National Park of the East oppose the bill.
> The owners do not oppose the development. They oppose that only a part
> of the jointly owned property has been benefited by the exclusion from
> the National Park where tourism development is banned. Lawyer Victor
> Livio Cedeño, son of one of the original owners of land adjacent to
> lot 20A, says that this would be fraud against all the other owners of
> the lot 20 that was expropriated in 1975 by the Balaguer government to
> create the National Park of the East. The other owners are the defunct
> company Casino Union Higueya, Elmudesi & Co., Jose Armenteros & Co.,
> Jorge Hazim Hnos. & Co., Rafael Maria Gatón, Francisco Roldan and
> Pedro Rolando Cedeño.
>
> Is Bahia de las Aguilas appropriate for mass tourism?
> The government's announcement to expropriate beach property part of
> the Jaragua National Park on the southwestern coast is also making
> headlines. This is not the first time the lands make headlines.
> Tourism development of the lands were halted when the Leonel Fernandez
> administration debated the expropriation of the lands during the last
> months of the Balaguer administration supposedly to be distributed to
> low income farmers as part of a Dominican Agrarian Institute program.
> The PLD government returned the lands to the National Park on grounds
> that they were part of a protected area and could not be used for
> farming purposes. But now, President Mejia has declared that the lands
> will be used to develop tourism projects to bring prosperity to the
> impoverished region. The government has not revealed names of the
> favored investors. Ecologist Eleuterio Martinez in an interview for
> the Listin Diario newspaper says that the land of the paradise-like
> Bahia de las Aguilas should be used exclusively for eco-tourism
> projects, that is tourists should be allowed to come for day visits
> only. He feels that visitors should be lodged in hotels located in
> less fragile areas, such as in nearby Cabo Rojo to Pedernales, or the
> areas of Cueva de Abajo, Cabo Rojo, to Bahia Honda. He feels the park
> area should be preserved free of construction. The Listin Diario
> report lists other case alerts affecting national parks. These include
> the illegal occupation of a strip of the National Park of Monte
> Cristi, despite a move by the Ministry of Environment to dislodge the
> invaders, many influential government officers. Also the present
> government has announced the construction of a highway communicating
> the provinces of San Jose de Ocoa y Monseñor Nouel that would affect
> another park. It donated a strip of the Mirador del Sur Park in Santo
> Domingo for the construction of a church and school (this was allowed
> in the previous government, the new government legalized the
> construction). And the Mejia administration has authorized the
> construction of sports installations for the Pan Am Games at the
> Mirador del Este National Park, which was opposed by former President
> Joaquin Balaguer under whose government the park was built. Eleuterio
> Martinez in the Listin Diario says that another government decision
> that is lethal to the environment is the elimination of the propane
> cooking gas subsidy. Cheap propane gas meant less trees would be cut
> for cooking. He also criticizes the governmental support to the
> Manabao-Bejucal-Taveras dam that would affect the ecology of
> Jarabacoa.
>
Received on Mon Mar 5 15:43:11 2001