ALMOST a million people marched in green in the Dominican Republic capital Santo Domingo on Sunday, calling for corrupt politicians to be brought to justice.

Marchers say the government is protecting former presidents Hipolito Mejia and Leonel Fernandez, who were at the helm when Brazilian construction company Odebrecht was bribing politicians to hand it public-sector contracts.

Former national water authority director Roberto Rodriguez and 11 other senior officials were arrested last year for involvement in the bribery scandal.

The Green March for the End of Impunity is also demanding that President Danilo Medina should be investigated.

All remaining Odebrecht contracts should be repealed, organisers say, including one for a coal-fired power station at Punta Catalina worth billions of dollars.

A statement from the march said that it demanded structural change “in order to once and for all remove criminal politicians and their economic, business and military allies from institutions and from all public spaces of the Dominican Republic, because criminals belong in jail, not in the state.”