Unhappy with the results of the Feb. 2 elections, a group in the Partido Liberación Nacional (PLN) are calling for their candidate Johnny Araya to renounce his political aspirations.
The discomfort by Liberationits is about the possible mortaging of the Balcón Verde property, the PLN headquarters located in La Sabana. For the group, that is the straw that broke the camel’s back.
“I fear this election is already lost and there is no possibility of reversing the result. What panics me is the possibility that the party leaders and Don Johnny intended to mortage the Balcón Verde. How will they be able to assure the payback of the loan when were are sure to lose?”, asks rhetorically Jorge Sánchez, former vice-minister of housing and PLN legislator.
Criticizing the leadership, besides their idea of taking out a mortgage on the property, is the waste of hiring ten luxury vehicles during the campaign, poor television ads that had no effect and the “hire me” strategy that had to be replaced at mid-election, contributing to Araya’s 20 percentage point drop in the polls.
“The best thing Johnny could do for himself, the party and the country is to remove himself from the process, avoid going to a second round and in honour of national unity, recognize the current political reality and offer his support to Luis Guillermo Solís and the new government ….,” Juan José Echeverría, former president of the IFAM, told La Republica.
According to the La Republica, no one in official capacity at the PLN would confirm or deny the mortaging of the PLN headquartes.
Esteban Arrieta, wrote that Antonio Álvarez Desanti, head of the PLN campaign, was out of the country on Wednesday. And no reply was received by Rolando Gomez, Araya’s campaign manager.
Source: La Republica
If the PLN really is mortgaging its headquarters to fund the run-off campaign, it would seem that they’re “going for broke”, that they’re staking the entire future of the PLN on Araya’s presidency. While at first blush this may seem foolhardy, perhaps it is a realistic viewpoint. If Araya loses this election, the PLN’s future as a major player may be over. I really don’t see Araya’s problem as one of political strategy or party politics, though – it seems that people just don’t like or trust him.