Costa Rica Election On A Knife-Edge

by Mike Godfrey, for LawAndTax-News.com, New York

08 February 2006

Although early exit polls had Nobel Peace Prize winner Oscar Arias, pictured, winning Sunday's presidential election in Costa Rica with nearly 45% of the votes, counting turned into a cliff-hanger, with rival Otton Solis gaining 40.2% of the vote to Arias's 40.7%.

40% is required for a first-round victory, and the close result may involve a recount by hand, taking more than a week. Mr Arias favours the CAFTA trade pact, whose approval is currently languishing in Costa Rica's legislature, while Mr Solis is against it.

Mr Arias, 65, served as the country's president from 1986 to 1990. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1987 after working to end armed struggles in other Central American countries.

The United States government has implemented CAFTA on January 1, despite the fact that Costa Rica has yet to ratify the agreement, the only stand-out among the six central american countries to sign it. The others are the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua.

CAFTA has eliminated duties on more than half the value of US farm exports to the region, expanded IP protections and opened telecommunications and other markets.

Outgoing President Abel Pacheco submitted the CAFTA to the Legislative Assembly in late October, in the face of threatened strikes, but the legislative process is expected to take several months.

Opposition in Costa Rica to CAFTA is a microcosm of the world-wide developing country fight against globalization and the Doha Round; failure on the part of Costa Rica to join CAFTA will send the wrong message to the enemies of free trade, and will encourage anti-liberalism in other Latin American states such as Venezuela, Peru and Ecuador.

But the counting isn't finished yet!

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