Title XI. One the Economic and Financial Regime of the Chamber of Accounts
Chapter I. On the Economic Regime
Section I. Guiding Principles
Article 217. Orientation and foundation
The economic regime is oriented towards the search for human development. It is based on economic growth, redistribution of wealth, social justice, equity, social and territorial cohesion and environmental sustainability in a framework of free competition, equality of opportunities, social responsibility, participation and solidarity.
Article 218. Sustainable growth
Private initiative is free. The State shall ensure, together with the private sector, an equilibrated and sustained growth of the economy, with stability of prices, tending toward full employment and the increase of social well-being, through rational utilization of the available resources, the permanent education of human resources and scientific and technological development.
Article 219. Private initiative
The State foments private economic initiative, creating policies necessary to promote the development of the country. Under the principle of subsidiarity of the State, by its own account or in association with the private and supportive sector, may exercise business activity with the end of ensuring access of the population to basic assets and services and promoting the national economy.
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When the state sells off its participation in a business, it may take the methods conducive to democratizing the ownership of its actions and offer to its workers, the solidarity organizations of workers, special conditions to gain said active property. The law shall regulate the subject.
Article 220. Subjectivity to the juridical laws
All contracts of the State and persons of Public Right with physical or juridical foreign persons housed in the country, should count on submission to the laws and jurisdictional organs of the Republic. Nevertheless, the State and the other persons of Public Right may submit the disputes derived from contractual relations to jurisdictions constituted in virtue of international treaties in effect. They may also submit them to national and international arbitrage in accordance with the law.
Article 221. Equality of treatment
Business activity, public or private, receives the same legal treatment. Equality of conditions of national and foreign investment is guaranteed, with the limitations established in this Constitution and the laws. The law shall concede special treatment to investments that are located in zones with a lower degree of development or in activities of national interest, in particular located in border provinces.
Article 222. Promotion of popular economic initiatives
The State recognizes the contribution of popular economic initiatives to the development of the country, foments the conditions of integration of the informal sector in the national economy, incentivizes and protects micro, small, and medium development of businesses, cooperatives, family businesses, and other forms of community association for work, production, savings, and consumption, that generate conditions that permit access to convenient financing, technical assistance, and training.
Section II. On the Monetary and Financial Regime
Article 223. Regulation of the monetary and financial system
The regulation of the monetary and financial system of the Nation is the responsibility of the Monetary Board as the superior organ of the Central Bank.
Article 224. Integration of the Monetary Board
The Monetary Board is integrated by no more than nine members including the Governor of the Central Bank, who presides over it, and ex officio members whose number shall not be more than three.
Article 225. Central Bank
The Central Bank of the Republic is an entity of Public Right with juridical personality, its own patrimony, and functional, budgetary, and administrative autonomy.
Article 226. Appointment of monetary authorities
The Monetary Board, represented by the Governor of the Central Bank, shall be in charge of the direction and adequate application of the monetary, exchange, and financial policies of the Nation and the coordination of the regulatory entities of the system and of the financial market.
Article 227. Direction of the monetary policies
The Monetary Board, represented by the Governor of the Central Bank, will have at its responsibility the direction and adequate application of the monetary, exchange and financial policies of the Nation and the coordination of the regulatory entities of the financial system and of the financial market.
Article 228. Issue of bills and coins
The Central Bank, whose capital is property of the State, is the sole issuer of bills and coins of national circulation and has as its objective to watch for the stability of prices.
Article 229. National monetary unit
The national monetary unit is the Dominican Peso.
Article 230. Legal force and tender of the monetary unit
Only bills issues and coins minted by the Central Bank shall have legal circulation and tender, under the unlimited guarantee of the State and in the proportions and conditions indicated by law.
Article 231. Prohibition of the issuance of monetary signs
The issuance of paper, coins, or other monetary signs not authorized by this Constitution is prohibited.
Article 232. Modification of the regime of coin or of the bank
By exception of that provided in Article 122 of this Constitution, the modification of the legal regime of coin or of the bank shall require the support of two thirds of the totality of the members of one and the other legislative chamber, provided that it has been initiated by the Executive Power, at the proposal of the Monetary Board or with the favorable vote of the same, in which case it shall be ruled by the related provisions of the organic laws.
Chapter II. On the Public Finances
Section I. On the General Budget of the State
Article 233. Elaboration of the budget
The elaboration of the project of Law of General Budget of the State, which considers the probable income, proposed expenses, and the required financing, realized in a framework of fiscal sustainability, ensuring that public indebtedness is compatible with the capacity of payment of the State, is the responsibility of the Executive Power.
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In this project the assignments that are the responsibilities of the different institutions of the State shall be allocated in an individualized manner.
Article 234. Modification of the budget
Congress may include new line items and modify those that figure into the project of Law of General Budget of the State or in the project of law that distribute funds submitted by the Executive Power, with the vote of two thirds of those present of each legislative chamber.
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Once the Law of General Budget of the State is voted, budgetary resources from on institution or another may not be transferred, unless in virtue of a law that, when it is not initiated by the Executive Power, shall have the vote of two thirds of those present in each legislative chamber.
Article 235. Majority of exception
The National Congress may modify the project of Law of General Budget of the State when it is submitted later than the date referred to by Article 128, number 2, part g, with the absolute majority of the membership of each chamber.
Article 236. Validity of distribution
No distribution of public funds shall be valid if it was not authorized by the law and ordered by an appropriate official.
Article 237. Obligation to identify resources
Laws that order, authorize a payment, or engender a pecuniary obligation to the charge of the State shall not have effect nor validity unless this same law identifies or establishes the resources necessary for its execution.
Article 238. Criteria for assignment of public spending
It is the responsibility of the State to realize an equitable assignment of the public spending in the territory. Its planning, programming, execution and evaluation shall respond to the principles of subsidiarity and transparency, as well as the criteria of efficiency, priority, and economy.
Article 239. Effectiveness of the Law of Budget
When the Congress has not approved the project of Law of General Budget of the State later than the 31st of December, the Law of General Budget of the State of the previous year shall rule, with the adjustments given in the Organic Law of Budget, until its approval is produced.
Article 240. Publication of general account
Annually, in the month of April, the general account of the incomes and expenditures of the Republic made in the year shall be published.
Section II. On the Planning
Article 241. Strategy of development
The Executive Power, after consulting the Economic and Social Council and the political parties, shall elaborate and submit to the National Congress a strategy of development that shall define the vision of the Nation for the long term. The process of planning and public investment shall be rules by the corresponding law.
Article 242. Multi-Year National Plan
The Multi-Year National Plan of the Public Sector and its corresponding updates shall be sent to the National Congress by the Executive Power, during the second legislature of the year in which the period of government begins, ager consulting the Council of Ministers for knowledge of the programs and projected that will be executed during its effectiveness. The results and impacts of its execution shall be realized in a framework of fiscal sustainability.
Section III. On Taxation
Article 243. Principles of the tax regime
The tax regime is based in the principles of legality, justice, equality and equity so that each male and female citizen may fulfill the maintenance of the public burdens.
Article 244. Exemptions from taxes and transferences of rights
Individuals may only acquire, through concessions that the law or authorizes or contracts that the National Congress approves, the right to benefit, for all the time that the concession or contract stipulates and fulfilling the obligations that one and another impose on them, of exemptions, exonerations, reductions or limitations of taxes, contributions, or fiscal or municipal rights that occur in certain works or businesses towards which it has been agreed to attract investment of new capitals for the growth of the national economy or for any other goal of social interest. The transference of rights authorized through contracts shall be subject to ratification on the part of the National Congress.
Chapter III. On Control of Public Funds
Article 245. Accounting system
The Dominican State and all its institutions, be they autonomous, decentralized or not, shall be ruled by a sole, uniform, integrated, and harmonized system of accounting, whose criteria shall be fixed by the law.
Article 246. Control and supervision of public funds
The control and supervision over the patrimony, income, expenses, and use of public funds shall be achieved by the National Congress, the Chamber of Accounts, the General Controller of the Republic in the frameworks of their respective responsibilities, and by the society through the mechanisms established in the laws.
Section I. On the Controller General of the Republic
Article 247. Internal control
The Controller General of the Republic is the organ of the Executive Power governing the internal control, exercise of internal supervision and the evaluation of the due collection, management, use and investment of the public resources and authorizes the orders of payment, after proof of fulfillment of the legal and administrative processes of the institutions under its sphere, in accordance with the law.
Section II. On the Chamber of Accounts
Article 248. External Control
The Chamber of Accounts is the superior external organ of fiscal control of the public resources, of the administrative processes and of the patrimony of the State. It has juridical personality, technical character and enjoys administrative, operative, and budgetary autonomy. It shall be composed of five members, elected by the Senate of the Republic from the shortlists presented to it by the Chamber of Deputies, for a period of four years and shall remain in their functions until their substitutes are appointed.
Article 249. Requirements
In order to be a member of the Chamber of Accounts one must be a male or female Dominican in full exercise of the civil and political rights, be of recognized ethical and moral solvency, have reached the age of thirty years, have a university degree and be prepared for the professional exercise, preferably in the areas of accounting, finance, economics, law or something related, and the other conditions that the law determines.
Article 250. Powers
Its powers shall be, other than those conferred to it by law:
- To examine the general and individual accounts of the Republic.
- To present to the National Congress reports about the supervision of the patrimony of the State.
- To audit and analyze the execution of the General Budget of the State at the National Congress approves each year, taking as base the state of collection and investment of the taxes presented by the Executive Power, in accordance with the Constitution and the laws, and to submit the corresponding report of this on the 30th of April at the latest of the following year, for its knowledge and decision.
- To issue norms with obligatory character for the inter-institutional coordination of the organs and bodies responsible for the control and auditing of the public resources.
- To make special investigations at the request of one or both legislative chambers.
Chapter IV. On the Social Agreement
Article 251. Economic and Social Council
The social agreement is an essential instrument to ensure the organized participation of employers, workers, and other organizations of society in the construction and permanent strengthening of the social peace. In order to promote it, there shall be an Economic and Social Council, consultative organ of the Executive Power in economic, social and labor subjects, whose conformation and functioning shall be established by the law.
