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DE RUEHDG #0484/01 1141843
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O 241843Z APR 09
FM AMEMBASSY SANTO DOMINGO
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 2638
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UNCLAS SANTO DOMINGO 000484 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE DEPARTMENT FOR WHA/CAR BPREMONT 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV KDEM PREL DR
SUBJECT: REFORMISTA PARTY LEADERSHIP BATTLE WORSENS SPLITS 
 
REF: A. 08 SDO 1513 
     ¶B. 08 SDO 1921 
     ¶C. 08 SDO 1666 
     ¶D. SDO 315 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary: The once mighty Reformista Party has become 
so fractured that it cannot proceed with the selection of a 
new set of leaders.  Indeed, one commentator referred to the 
party as an "archipelago of individual interests."  New 
leadership was to have been selected last autumn, but this 
was postponed until March 2009.  After some confusion, the 
selection process has been delayed yet again - without a firm 
deadline being set.  While the party may not entirely 
disappear, it could be reduced to being just another minor 
party that swirls around President Fernandez.  Or, some 
speculate, the party could one day become a vehicle for 
Fernandez to promote his wife's political career.  Certainly, 
absent a real change in attitudes among the party's 
squabbling leaders, the Reformista Party will not contribute 
to the health of Dominican democracy as a responsible 
opposition party that offers reasonable alternatives to the 
President's wishes.  End Summary. 
 
What if they gave a party and nobody came? 
------------------------------------------ 
 
¶2. (SBU) The efforts of the Social Christian Reform Party 
(PRSC) to revitalize itself have been going on since the 
party was crushed in the May 2008 Dominican presidential 
elections (reftels A - B).  After inconclusive efforts in the 
Autumn of 2008, the Reformista Party, as the PRSC is also 
called, planned to select new leadership by February or March 
¶2009.  However, divisions within the party worsened over the 
intervening months, not least over the question of  whether 
the new leadership should be agreed upon by consensus or 
elected in nationwide primaries. 
 
¶3. (SBU) At the beginning of March, the President of the 
Party (Federico Autun Batlle) and General Secretary (Victor 
Gomez Casanova) called for "General Internal Primaries" to be 
held on March 29, 2009.  Certainly, the party's statutes 
required action by then, but this move led to cries of foul 
by those interested in a consensus approach, such as powerful 
Santiago mayor Jose 
Enrique Sued (reftel C).  In February, the Executive 
Commission of the PRSC had approved the selection of the 
leadership by consensus, in hopes of reunifying the party. At 
that time, it looked like Sued would emerge as First VP of 
the PRSC, while Congressman Victor "Ito" Bisono (reftels) 
would become the new PRSC General Secretary. 
 
¶4. (SBU) Then, in mid-March a group of ex-PRSC officials from 
several provinces announced that they would not return to the 
party's fold.  Instead, they would continue to "follow Leonel 
Fernandez."  Among this group is Walter Musa, mayor of Puerto 
Plata, and the DR Ambassador to Colombia, Angel Lockwood.  In 
so doing, they are emulating the lead of the Foreign 
Minister, Carlos Morales Troncoso - a top PRSC leader, and 
now a key member of the Fernandez administration. 
 
¶5. (U) The internal divisions next led to an announcement, 
days before the planned March 29 event, that the process of 
leadership selection would be suspended.  Shortly thereafter, 
a party official and member of its Organizing Committee 
indicated that an effort would be made to convoke an 
"Extraordinary Convention" of the PRSC on April 19, at which 
some 1,300 delegates should approve changes to the party's 
statutes, thereby paving the way for some kind of leadership 
selection on or about May 3, 2009.  (Note: The Extraordinary 
Convention has now been re-scheduled for June 7, by which 
time DR legislators should be finished changing the 
constitution. End Note.) 
 
¶6. (U) Reformista optimism following that announcement, if 
any, did not last long: On March 25, the Central Elections 
Board (JCE) declared that the PRSC would not be among those 
parties sharing a substantial portion of the government funds 
that go to support political campaigns in the Dominican 
Republic. According to Dominican law, 80 percent of 
government-sourced campaign financing must go the party or 
parties that receive at least five percent of the vote.  The 
other 20 percent are shared by all other parties.  In the 
2008 presidential elections, the PRSC received 4.59 percent 
of the vote.  The PRSC had petitioned for that figure to be 
"rounded up," and also pointed to the 15 percent of the vote 
it got in congressional and mayoral elections in 2006, but 
the JCE ruled against the request. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶7. (SBU) One political commentator, Juan Bolivar Diaz, 
surveyed the wreckage in a recent editorial and concluded, 
"The prospects for the PRSC are (poor): not recuperation, but 
more dispersion, since many of its leaders are scrambling for 
the benefits that the new (Fernandez) constitution offers." 
Yet Fernandez needs some PRSC support to ensure that his 
desired reforms receive the necessary two-thirds vote in 
Congress (reftel D).  So, Diaz indicated, the PRSC - or a 
significant part thereof - will agree to ally itself with the 
PLD in legislative and municipal elections to be held 14 
months from now. 
 
¶8. (SBU) We would argue that instead of seeking short-term 
alliances that facilitate patronage, PRSC leaders would 
better serve Dominican democracy if they reconstituted the 
PRSC as a party with principles and programs. End Comment. 
BULLEN