CAFTA: Point of Disagreement in Costa Rica

by Roy Rojas
In the last two years, in Central America and the Dominican Republic, a lot of political discussion has centered around the good and the bad that would come from the proposed free trade agreement with the United States. Out of all the countries involved, Costa Rica is the only one that has not ratified the Central American Free Trade Agreement. This is because an opposition of minority parties has tried to kidnap the Legislative Assembly and to obstruct all parliamentary progress.

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http://www.globalvoicesonline.org/2007/03/14/the-costa-rican-media-ignored-the-anti-cafta-march/">
by Juliana Rincón Parra

El Sr. Masís de Moravia. by Juliaa (The sign reads “If CAFTA passes we’ll be slaves like this donkey.”)

Cristian Cambronero from Fusil de Chispas [es] sums up the blogger perspective on the Costa Rica Anti-Cafta marches in his February 28th post. The media refused to report on the event, and when they did, they insisted on stating that no one had showed up. On some of the blogs he links to there are comparisons of pictures of prior rallies with the newspaper´s tally compared to pictures of this latest march and and the numbers don´t add up. It seems the Costa Rican blogging community took it in their hands to report on what they saw and heard that day. The cited articles are in Spanish:

“Civilian journalism for some. People saying things. The Anti-Cafta march that took place last monday left much to be said…” in Desencantosdesirena (Mermaid´s Disenchantments):

Si en enero había 50 mil en tres cuadras y media y había 23500 en 16 cuadras de marcha, pues la única explicación es que los de la “marea verde” de Arias se multiplicaron… como los votos en la Sala Cuarta, en el TSE y en las encuestas…

If in January there were 50 thousand people in three and a half blocks and there were 23,500 in 16 blocks, then the only explanation is that those in Oscar Arias’ “green tide” multiplied… just like the votes in the Sala Cuarta (Fourth Chamber of the Supreme Court in Costa Rica, concentrating on civil, succession law, labor, and family law), in the Supreme Electoral Tribunal and in the polls