The inauguration ceremony, very different from the one held in 2020, marked by the Covid-19 pandemic and carried out with absolute discretion, takes place at the National Theater in the presence of official delegations from dozens of countries.
Among the attendees are King Felipe VI of Spain; the presidents of Paraguay, Santiago Peña Palacio, Panama, Jose Raul Mulino, and Guatemala, Bernardo Arevalo; Guyana’s Prime Minister Mark Phillips, and Suriname’s Head of State Chandrikapersad Santokhi.
The prime ministers of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas, Philip Edward Davis, Curaçao and head of the Netherlands delegation, Gilmar Pisas, and Belize, John Briceño; Antigua and Barbuda’s Governor General Rodney Williams; and El Salvador’s Vice President Felix Ulloa, are also on the list.
Also present are Cuba’s Deputy Prime Minister Jorge Luis Tapia Fonseca, Serbia’s Minister of Internal and External Trade Tomislav Momirovic, and US Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm, among others.
Abinader, 57 of Lebanese descent, comes from a wealthy family with major businesses in tourism, higher education, and cement manufacturing, known as Abicor Business Group.
The president, re-elected with nearly 58 percent of the valid votes in May, won that post in 2020 after founding the Modern Revolutionary Party (PRM, in Spanish) in 2014 with politicians from the Dominican Revolutionary Party (PRD, in Spanish).
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