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Costa Rica, the most stable democracy in Central America, lived an electoral day in total calm where the great protagonist was abstention, which reached 42.85%. The winner of the elections was Rodrigo Chaves, who will become the nation’s 49th president after leading a political campaign that focused his message on change and the fight against corruption. In this edition of El Debate we analyze the profile of the newly elected president of Costa Rica.
The newly elected president of Costa Rica is from the nascent center-right Social Democratic Progress Party and obtained 52.9% of the votes, which will allow him to assume the presidency on May 8 for a four-year term.
The economist was Minister of Finance between 2019 and 2020, and before that he held different positions at the World Bank, where he received an internal sanction in 2019 after being denounced for sexual harassment by several co-workers.
These complaints and sanctions have been the stain on his career and the most notorious scandal. However, this did not prevent him from convincing many Costa Ricans who opted for a politician and a party that are not part of the Costa Rican political tradition.
Chaves receives a Costa Rica with a seriously affected economy that is trying to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic and that seeks to be much more attractive to investors and tourism. But for Costa Ricans there are other priorities. According to a survey by the University of Costa Rica, 29.1% of Costa Ricans indicated that what worries them most is unemployment; while for 17.8% it is the country’s economy and for 10.6% the issue of concern is corruption.
The elected president, Rodrigo Chaves, has other challenges ahead: governing with a bench of just 10 deputies out of a total of 57 that confirm the Legislative, therefore, he will have to weave alliances; increase the money in the public coffers; deal with the arrival of migrants from Nicaragua; enhances the welfare system; bet on the development of the regions, especially the coasts of the country and drug trafficking, among other topics that we will analyze together with our guests:
– Eugenia Aguirre Raftacco, political scientist and researcher at the National Policy Observatory of the University of Costa Rica
– María Fernanda Bustamante, political scientist at the National Policy Observatory in Costa Rica.
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