Interesting Things For you Late @ Night 2: Dominican president wins 3rd term

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Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Dominican president wins 3rd term - CNN.com

(CNN) -- Dominican Republic President Leonel Fernandez, who led the island nation out of dire economic times, was re-elected to a third term on Saturday, according to election results.

Dominican President Leonel Fernandez, with his wife, Margarita, declares victory early Saturday.

Fernandez took nearly 54 percent of the vote in a multiparty race, avoiding a runoff. His main rival, center-leftist candidate Miguel Vargas, took roughly 40 percent of the vote and said he accepted the results shortly after Fernandez declared victory.
In an exclusive interview with CNN en Español, Fernandez called on opposition members to work with him to continue efforts that have turned the Dominican Republic into one of the fastest-growing economies in the Caribbean.
"I understand that democracy implies the sharing of a common place, a civilized coexistence for the good of the nation," Fernandez said. "Therefore, yesterday I called upon the [opposition] Dominican Revolutionary Party to join in.
"I will expect for them to answer to my call positively, because we are no longer campaigning, the elections are over. The country needs to unify again and start thinking as a nation and face the challenges that await."

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President eyes legacy in bid for re-election

Born in Santo Domingo and raised in New York City, Fernandez first won the presidency in 1996 as a liberal, after conservative Joaquin Balaguer lost the tight grip on power he had held for most of the prior three decades.
Fernandez proved popular during his first term, when he was credited with helping to improve the impoverished nation's economy. But the constitution did not allow for a second consecutive presidential term, and he was replaced in 2000 by Hipolito Mejia, an agronomist whose rule was marked by massive corruption that riddled the banking system.
Though Mejia altered the constitution to allow a president to serve back-to-back terms, he then lost his re-election bid in 2004 to Fernandez, who won a second term with 57 percent of the vote.
Over time, Fernandez's political stances have seen some change, with him recently laying claim to the legacy of former President Balaguer, thereby signaling a rightward move for his Dominican Liberation Party (PLD).
"Nobody will take Dr. Leonel Fernandez from this country. Only God, when he dies," said supporter Bienvenido Rosario, a farmer who credits Fernandez with turning the economy around -- particularly a government move to subsidize an onion crop he says was on the brink of being lost.