A group of owners bars and restaurants of Bávaro-Punta Cana announced that they will close their businesses next Monday, April 4 as a method of protest against the authorities who, according to complaints, prevent them from operating after 12:00 midnight in the tourist area.
The owners of at least 56 businesses located in the tourist strip expressed that, despite the fact that throughout the national territory the restrictive measuresthe area that first overcame COVID-19, and that has reported the highest number of vaccinated people (La Altagracia province), continues to be “the one that suffers the most from the harassment of authorities to limit customer service hours.
In a press release, they narrated that after operating with a schedule until four in the morning for 14 years, currently the tourists They are forced to leave their shops by agents who inspect after 12:00 am, “even with visible weapons.” They bequeathed that this leaves a sad experience for foreigners who leave the hotels after 10:30 at night looking to get to know the area and have another option to have fun.
They indicated that the actions of the authorities “is frustrating the atmosphere of peace, joy and safe fun that has always characterized Punta Cana Bávaro.”
Katy Soto, president of the Association of Bars and restaurants of Bávaro Punta Cana, expressed his sorrow for what he describes as, “what has never been seen in our area, a retaliation against those of us who create jobs, those of us who stimulate tourism and those of us who receive the few tourists who manage to get out of the hotels looking to get to know our culture of merengue, bachata and folk culture”.
Soto said that as a businesswoman she has suffered from economic losses due to restrictive measures. He assured that he has exhausted all the pertinent steps so that the authorities understand the situation that should have been avoided, “Chu Vásquez knows it, that I have gone to his office and to the other authorities, and I warned them that the productive sector I would put up with such measures,” he concluded.
“We have been prudent, decent and extremely patient. Prudent because we jealously guard our tourism and comply with all requests from Luis Abinader as president, to obey the measures in the face of the pandemic; decent because we have avoided scandals that affect our image of the safe area that we are and patients because we have endured humiliation, violence and even physical attacks on colleagues avoiding going to the extreme that we are forced today… to close our businesses and dress in mourning, “said Soto.
