Minister of Culture meets with executives from the Dominican Society of Bibliophiles

Minister of Culture meets with executives from the Dominican Society of Bibliophiles
Santo Domingo, August 24 2013

The Minister of Culture, José Antonio Rodríguez, had a meeting this past Friday with executives from the Dominican Society of Bibliophiles, during which he clarified that the Ministry of Culture has no responsibility for the interruption of the subsidy they were receiving from the government.

The following persons attended the meeting for the Society of Bibliophiles: Mariano A. Mella, President, Dennis R. Simó, Vice President, and Enver López Milander, Communications Manager.

At the meeting, Minister Rodríguez was accompanied by the Administrator of the Ministry of Culture, Irasema Jiminián; Milton Mena, Director General of Finance, and Alberto Valenzuela, General Technical Manager.

Minister Rodríguez said that he had invited the executives of the Society to his office to talk to them about the public legal action they have filed.

Rodríguez showed them and read a letter from the Ministry of Culture in which it expresses to the Directorate General of Budget its concerns about the exclusion of the Dominican Society of Bibliophiles from receiving the benefits of the subsidy in 2013.
The meeting took place in a friendly atmosphere and concluded with the decision by the executives from the Dominican Society of Bibliophiles to head to the National Budget Office to request the pertinent explanations regarding their exclusion from receiving those benefits.

In turn, Jiminián, Mena and Valenzuela, explained to the delegation of the Society of Bibliophiles that this type of exclusion happens when an NGO does not meet a number of requirements that have been requested by the state agency.

They clarified that once the requirements are met and approved by the Budget Office, the Ministry of Culture is only the channel through which the subsidy is delivered to an NGO.
The President of the Society, Mariano A. Mella said that they had met the requirements to be included, and pledged to head to the Budget Office to clarify the situation they have been denouncing.