Gonzalo Castillo, Margarita Cedeño, Abel Martínez, Francisco Domínguez Brito, Maritza Hernández and Andrés Navarro are the ones who so far have aspirations to seek the Dominican Liberation Party’s presidential candidacy for 2024-2028.
This group announced last Sunday by the PLD Secretary General has a history in public office and some of them are signaling that they will seek the presidency of the republic.
Abel Martinez
The current mayor of Santiago is in his second consecutive term, receiving nearly 50% of the votes cast in the extraordinary municipal elections of March 15, 2020, and is one of the few to receive receivership from the Party of the Dominican Republic. Liberation.
Martínez also ranks third with the most votes in the recent Political Committee election in early March. Despite the curator’s failure to disclose his ambitions, a billboard was posted in Santiago at the beginning of this year stating that “whoever changes a city can change a country” as a candid motivation for his ambitions.
Margaret Cedeno
The former Vice President of the Republic was the voting mate of Danilo Medina when he won the presidency in 2016 with over 62% of the votes cast and also held the same position in 2012.
Cedeño also enjoyed great popularity during her eight years as first lady and in Leonel Fernández’s two administrations, she was responsible for managing the social policy of the state, as well as being ranked fifth in the Political Committee elections. last month.
Although she never officially announced it, the former official has always been identified as a possible presidential candidate for the PLD. During the former official party’s internal pre-campaign, he came to warn his fellow PLD leaders that it was necessary to seek a third avenue because the two existed, that of Fernández (who is no longer in the party) and that of former president Medina meant “lose-lose”, while with her it would be “win-win” and then she revealed that the Medina sector within the PLD had proposed her husband, the then president of the PLD, to deceive Cedeño. Fernández as a unitary candidate, who was presumably rejected by the latter.
There are those who like the theory that the level of acceptance declined after agreeing to become Gonzalo Castillo’s voice partner.
Gonzalo Castillo. Placeholder image
Castillo was the person to beat Fernández by a small margin in the October 2019 primaries (which resulted in the ex-president’s departure after claiming there was an alleged fraud with the automated voting equipment) and had a great rating during his seven -year term of office as Minister of Public Works and Communications.
However, the former presidential candidate barely exceeded 30% in the presidential election, he was the protagonist of the PLD’s “worst” electoral defeat in recent history and was designated the “danilato” candidate at the time.
The former official comes with pressure to be the second most voted in the internal elections to determine the members of the Political Committee.
Dominguez Brito
The former Environment Minister stems from the fact that he was most voted in the political committee elections, but he was not elected on any of the occasions when he competed for that place in the former official party.
The furthest behind
A little behind those candidates is former Education Minister Andrés Navarro, who also participated in the October 2019 primaries before retiring from the race and supporting Gonzalo Castillo’s candidacy.
The former Secretary of State fought for the post of secretary general of the party at the last internal congress, third behind Mariotti and former executive vice president of the Dominican Corporation of State Electric Companies (Cdeee), Rubén Bichara .
One of the contenders was also named (by Mariotti) the former Home Secretary and Police Minister, Carlos Amarante Baret, who competed equally in the previous primaries before retiring to support Gonzalo Castillo.
Amarante Baret said on his Twitter account that he has not made the official announcement yet because “it is too early to get the country into politics”.
Maritza Hernández was the only woman to run in the primaries on October 6, nearly two years ago, and at the time she claimed she was murdered by the “nato” (a group that supposedly works within the Political Committee and is the one who decisions).
Hernández is a member of the PLD’s political committee and was Minister of Labor in 2016, but she hasn’t gained much political traction outside of it.
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Needs approval from central committee
At the time the list was presented, the PLD Secretary General assured that it was not “final” as it had to be approved by the central committee of the former official party.
They need to meet Danilo
Several months ago, the PLD secretary assured that those seeking presidential candidacy should meet with him and the party’s chairman, Danilo Medina.
“The interested parties should meet with the party chairman and the general secretary, so the guidelines are drawn up, this with the aim that it does not contradict the transformation and reorganization process to choose the new middle authorities and the bases of the party. “explains Mariotti, in mid-March.