This is a political comment, so if you are offended by politics, change the page.
In the last decade or so I have seen the process of electing a number of presidents in Costa Rica, starting with Miguel Angel Rodriguez, to my neighbours Abel Pacheco and Oscar Arias, and in 2010, Laura Chinchilla.
During this process there has been one candidate who has stood out, Otto Guevara. Only because he has been there for three previous elections.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not becoming political, leaning towards a candidate or party. No, just a casual observer of the process, a process that there are hasn’t shown me anything new in the past decade or so.
In this election Don Otto can smell a win. With the Araya campaign falling apart (a subject for another story), Otto’s focus is, in his words, his real opponent, José María Villalta, a politician that maybe too young and inexperienced for Costa Ricans to vote for.
I say this because the Movimiento Libertario (ML) party is spending oodles of cash to get to the “young” and “popular” vote, the voter profile of the Frente Amplio party.
The ML said on Monday that they will be spending up to ¢400 million colones up to January 29, the last day of campaigning before the elections on February 2.
And 10% or ¢40 million colones of that was spent during the Zapore fair – more to the point the bulls event – alone, on television commercials and other media. The Zapote fair ran from December 25 to January 5 – 11 days, however, because of the “politicking” during the year-end holidays, the ¢40 melones were spent in just four days, from Jan 2 to 5. That’s a lot of melones! And on one, albeit the most important, event in Costa Rica at this time of year.
Hopefully in these last few weeks leading up to the elections things will get interesting.
If not, there is always the next one. And I can bet the back 40, Otto will be there. Again.
