{"id":521696,"date":"2026-08-15T16:14:30","date_gmt":"2026-08-15T20:14:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/uncategorized\/leonel-fernandez-considers-santiago-matias-a-communicational-phenomenon-but-not-a-consolidated-political-project\/"},"modified":"2026-08-15T16:14:30","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T20:14:30","slug":"leonel-fernandez-considers-santiago-matias-a-communicational-phenomenon-but-not-a-consolidated-political-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/dominican-news\/leonel-fernandez-considers-santiago-matias-a-communicational-phenomenon-but-not-a-consolidated-political-project\/","title":{"rendered":"Leonel Fern\u00e1ndez considers Santiago Mat\u00edas a communicational phenomenon, but not a consolidated political project"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Santo Domingo.-<\/strong> The former President of the Republic and leader of the People’s Force, Leonel Fern\u00e1ndez<\/strong>, assessed the impact of Santiago Mat\u00edas, known as Alofoke<\/strong>,<\/a> in communication and in an important sector of Dominican society, although he considered that turning that communicational phenomenon into a political project represents a different challenge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fern\u00e1ndez described Mat\u00edas as a \u201ccommunicational phenomenon\u201d<\/strong> and highlighted his ability to innovate in ways of communicating, noting that his style has managed to connect with an important segment of the population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You might be interested in:<\/strong> Luis\u00edn Mej\u00eda asserts Santiago Mat\u00edas has enough followers to formalize his party<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHe has become a communicational phenomenon. I believe he has innovated a way of communicating that pleases an important sector of the Republic,\u201d <\/strong>Fern\u00e1ndez expressed when referring to Mat\u00edas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, when questioned about whether Santiago Mat\u00edas represents a new generation of politicians with the potential to lead the destiny of the Dominican Republic, Fern\u00e1ndez drew distinctions between success in the field of communication and the construction of a political organization with real possibilities of attaining power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The political leader maintained that in order to venture into electoral politics with possibilities, one needs territorial strength, to be part of a project of historical significance, and to have a vision for the future<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In that sense, Fern\u00e1ndez explained that it is one thing to develop a political project of power and another to promote a project of communicational transformation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When asked about the possibility of Mat\u00edas forming a political party and eventually becoming a candidate, the former president pointed out that the creation of a party organization implies a process of national organization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA party has to be organized at a national level, as we have done with the Fuerza del Pueblo. That is something else\u201d, <\/strong>he stated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Santiago is not new to politics <\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The foray of Santiago Mat\u00edas, \u201cAlofoke,\u201d<\/strong> into Dominican politics is not recent. In July 2022, the businessman and communicator announced his aspirations for the senate of the Santo Domingo province and asserted that he had \u201cclear aspirations and ideas,\u201d although at that time he did not belong to any party. He even suggested that the organization that backed his candidacy could count on significant electoral support from him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Four years later, Mat\u00edas has taken a more ambitious step. On July 22, 2026<\/strong>, he announced that he decided to create his own political party with the aim of participating in the 2028 elections, ruling out the proposals that, as he claimed, he received from more than 15 political organizations to assume a presidential candidacy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In his announcement, Mat\u00edas explained that the decision responds to the need to build an organization based on \u201cinnovative ideas and principles\u201d<\/strong>, with a vision for the future and leadership committed to leaving behind what he termed the \u201cold politics\u201d<\/strong>. He also informed that he will travel across the national territory to collect the necessary signatures and request the recognition of the new organization before the Central Electoral Board.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The announcement came after weeks of discussion regarding the possibility of Mat\u00edas heading the presidential ticket for the Social Christian Reformist Party (PRSC)<\/strong>. The communicator himself had previously conditioned an eventual candidacy for that organization on changes within its ranks, but ultimately opted to promote his own political structure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The project still faces the challenge of transforming from a platform based primarily on its enormous capacity for digital communication and mobilization into a political organization with territorial structure, members, leaders, and national presence<\/strong>. An analysis published by Acento points out that Mat\u00edas would have to gather more than 87,000 signatures and build a national structure to achieve recognition from the JCE.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Santo Domingo.- The former President of the Republic and leader of the People’s Force, Leonel Fern\u00e1ndez, assessed the impact of Santiago Mat\u00edas, known as Alofoke, in communication and in an important sector of Dominican society, although he considered that turning that communicational phenomenon into a political project represents a different challenge. Fern\u00e1ndez described Mat\u00edas as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":521697,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[40216],"tags":[44706,711,2005],"class_list":["post-521696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dominican-news","tag-dominicans-first","tag-leonel-fernandez","tag-santiago-matias"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/phj1q1-2bIs","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/images-16.jpg","dum_api":{"author_name":"Arelis Suero","author_image":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/cropped-cropped-Diseno-sin-titulo-41-96x96.jpg","categories_name":["Dominican News"],"featured_media_url":"https:\/\/cdn.deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/images-16.jpg"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/521696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=521696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/521696\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/521697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=521696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=521696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=521696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}