Q COSTARICA — Laura Fernández, the ruling party candidate, won the February 1 election with a resounding victory and a legislative majority, an undeniable result that favors the ruling party led by Rodrigo Chaves.
However, the party failed to attract 66% of the population, with slightly more than half voting for opposition parties and almost half abstaining.
This is one of the results of the national elections, which took on a plebiscite-like character, more so than ever before, for the incumbent president. Recent polls by the Center for Political Research and Studies (CIEP) at the University of Costa Rica (UCR) show her with an approval rating of nearly 60%, and other private studies show it reaching as high as 70%, the figure he prefers to repeat when speaking of popular support.
These being the first elections for the Partido Pueblo Soberano (PPSO), the vehicle chosen by the Chavista leadership to translate the popular support Chaves had received since taking office into the ballot box, the driving force behind this movement resided in the president’s preponderant figure, and the challenge was to try to transfer that political capital to the chosen candidate, Laura Fernández.
The main result of the elections indicates that this transfer of political capital was indeed sufficiently achieved, that Chaves’s undeniable prominence in electoral matters and the PPSO’s constant allusions to Chaves, as well as to the supposed need for “continuity”—one of Fernández’s campaign mantras—worked. The goal of a first-round victory is now within reach, but the numbers also tell a different story.
Fernández obtained 48% of the valid votes, which indicates that slightly more than half preferred other options. It could have been the candidacy of Álvaro Ramos, of the Partido Liberacion Nacional (PLN), who was expected to be doomed in this election, or that of Claudia Dobles, of the Coalicion Agenda Cuidadana (CAC), the new version of the Partido Accion Cuidadana (PAC), which was ruined four years ago after the highly unpopular government of her husband, Carlos Alvarado, ended.
The CAC attracted almost 5% of voters, one point more than the candidacy of Ariel Robles, of the Frente Amplio (FA), the leftist group that since 2022 has led the most aggressive opposition against the Chaves government and which also gained ground this time. In addition, 16 other presidential hopefuls, most with campaign messages critical of the ruling party, captured almost 10% of the electorate.
In short: 51.7% of people cast a vote for an option other than Chavista “continuity” in the presidential election.
Meanwhile, 1.1 million Costa Ricans who were registered to vote did not cast their ballots at all. While the reasons for abstention are varied, it is safe to say that these people were also not swayed by the numerous campaign-style messages from the government and the official proselytizing network.
This leads to the following results, which can be summarized as follows: one-third voted for the Chavista “continuity,” one-third voted against it, and one-third did not vote. Therefore, the conclusion is clear: the majority of the country did not support the ruling party at the polls, despite the majority support for Chaves and the government, according to the polls.
In other words, the vote for Laura Fernández was only half that of the people who support Chaves, according to the polls he often cites.
Questions of the Winner vs. Opposition Resistance
The reasons are still being studied and may be associated, among other factors, with the candidate’s profile or even with a civic attitude of differentiating between support for a politician, a movement, or the desire for them to remain in power.
The profile of pro-Chavismo voters is still unknown, beyond the information from voting intention polls, which indicated a predominance of men and older people. A greater presence was also indicated in Puntarenas, Alajuela, and Limón, although Guanacaste was also mentioned, where results ultimately gave the PPSO 58%.
The majority government power is clear in the three coastal provinces and the cantons of Alajuela bordering Nicaragua, with support levels of 60% or more for the PPSO, which is close to the national average approval rating for President Chaves.
In contrast, in other provinces or cantons the support was not reflected as much at the polls, since even the PLN triumphed in some territories with a higher socioeconomic level or more attachment to tradition, such as Cartago in general, the canton of Dota, Zarcero or the cantons of Montes de Oca, Escazú or Belén.
This minority percentage of Chavista support at the polls, while sufficient to remain in the Executive branch and secure a majority in the Legislative Assembly (though not reaching the 40 seats they had hoped for), could be an unfavorable indicator for major projects of the current administration, such as the proposed constitutional reforms and even a draft of a new Political Constitution, as Chaves himself has mentioned.
Another relevant comparison is the absolute number of votes Fernández received versus those garnered by Rodrigo Chaves in 2022, in the runoff election that brought him to power. After this highly popular administration, marked by numerous messages against opposition parties and traditional politics—including constant allusions to the elections under the symbolic “tick-tock” of the time remaining until the vote—Fernández obtained almost 1.2 million votes, only 165,000 more than his mentor received when he faced José María Figueres. In other words, the growth of “Chavismo” between the two elections was 16%.
Political scientist Ronald Alfaro, coordinator of the CIEP at the University of Costa Rica, confirmed the plebiscite-like nature of this election, due to the personalistic leadership of Rodrigo Chaves as the driving force behind the movement represented by Fernández. “There is a significant difference between the number of people who support the Presidency and those who were with this movement. This can be seen as a challenge for this new political force in the midst of its consolidation,” he commented.
He explained that, amidst the national political realignment, there are new elements such as the ruling movement, but also circumstances that remain the same. “There is a new order mixed with the old order. It’s not that everything collapsed,” Alfaro added, while also mentioning the possibility that Fernández’s government will carry out “campaign” actions from the beginning of its term, as Chaves did during his four years in office.
Meanwhile, the PLN remains the main opposition force, regardless of whether its votes are due to the party or the direct influence of the candidate, Álvaro Ramos. In 2022, they received 571,000 votes in the first round, with candidate José María Figueres, but this time they received 825,000, a 44% increase.
Furthermore, the Frente Amplio saw a significant increase in its vote share for representatives, rising from 173,000 in the 2022 election to over 292,000 in this election, a growth of almost 70%. This allows them to secure a bloc of seven representatives, which is expected to be a strong opposition voice to the Fernández administration.
Even the PAC, in its coalition version, managed to recover from its poor showing, going from a meager 13,000 votes and zero seats in 2022 to attracting almost 120,000 votes this time around. This allows it to reach 4.85% of the total valid votes for the Presidency and, at the very least, the right to offset some of its campaign expenses with “political debt,” as well as securing a legislative seat.
The PLN, FA, and PAC have all been the target of harsh attacks from President Rodrigo Chaves and, consequently, from his most enthusiastic collaborators and supporters. However, the “definitive poll” shows that the combined results of these three parties are higher than they were four years ago. In 2022, the three parties together garnered 768,000 votes for the Legislative Assembly, and in 2026, 1,037,000, a 35% increase. For the congressional seats, these three parties garnered approximately 733,000 votes four years ago, and now they capture 862,000.
The growth of Chavismo, especially in terms of congressional seats, appears to have taken its toll on other parties, such as the Nueva Republica (PNR) and the Partido Liberal Progresivo (PLP), which have disappeared, and on another, the Partido Unidad Social Cristiana (PUSCP, which has plummeted from nine seats to just one.
Article translated and adapted from ‘El “lado B” del resultado electoral: solo un tercio de la población votó por el chavismo‘ published at SemanarioUniversidad.com.