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RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC PRIORITY

C O N F I D E N T I A L SAN JOSE 000624 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR WHA/CEN; WHA/PPC 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/29/2019 
TAGS: KDEM PGOV PINR PREL CS
SUBJECT: COSTA RICA'S FIRST FEMALE PRESIDENT? SCENESETTER 
FOR THE 2010 ELECTIONS 
 
Classified By: CDA Peter M. Brennan for reason 1.4 (d) 
 
¶1. (C) SUMMARY: With Costa Rica's presidential primary season 
now over, the stakes are set for the February 2010 national 
election.  For the first time in Costa Rican history, a 
female candidate, Laura Chinchilla from the Partido 
Liberacion Nacional (PLN), has a strong chance to become 
President.  Chinchilla, who was President Oscar Arias's 
vice-president before declaring her candidacy, handily won 
her party's hotly-contested June 7 primary election.  The 
other two major-party candidates, Otton Solis from the 
Partido Accion Ciudadana (PAC) and former-President Rafael 
Angel Calderon from the Partido Union Social Cristiana 
(PUSC), are both political retreads who starkly contrast with 
Chinchilla's "fresher" public persona.  In addition, Calderon 
has an ongoing legal case stemming from 2004 corruption 
charges.  END SUMMARY 
 
---------------------------------------- 
THE REAL GENERAL ELECTION? PLN'S PRIMARY 
---------------------------------------- 
 
¶2. (SBU) In some ways, PLN's June 7 primary had all the 
appearances of a general election, from the large turnout of 
over half-a-million voters, to the fact that whomever emerged 
as the winner would be the favorite to win the 2010 
presidential elections.  Additionally, it was the only 
presidential primary that had an open, country-wide election 
in which all Costa Ricans could vote.  While San Jose Mayor 
Johnny Araya, Chinchilla's chief adversary in the PLN 
primary, had led in the polls through March, Chinchilla had 
overtaken Araya by May 2009.  Most of those polls gave a 
small advantage to Chinchilla going into the primary, though 
many experts still believed that Araya's well organized 
campaign might actually surge ahead for an election day 
victory. 
 
¶3. (C) Araya's popularity sprang from his accomplishments as 
mayor of San Jose, not the least of which was his general 
managerial efficiency in Costa Rica's hectic capital (despite 
consistent rumors of corruption, which haunted him throughout 
the campaign).  He also brought a subtle form of 
traditionalist populism to the race, running on a slogan of 
"the power of the people" and targeting those that have felt 
left behind in Costa Rica's trend toward modernization and 
economic development over the last decade.  Araya also 
appealed to those who, at some level, weren't ready to vote 
for a woman for president.  Araya's biggest appeal, however, 
might have been that of an alternative to the PLN's "Arias 
faction", of which Chinchilla was considered a member. 
 
¶4. (C) Despite high approval ratings, there is a small core 
of voters who strongly dislike President Arias and his 
brother Rodrigo Arias, considering them oligarchs who 
"rigged" the 2003 constitutional amendment process which 
permitted Arias to run again; the 2006 national elections; 
and even the 2007 CAFTA referendum, to pursue their own 
agenda.  Araya presented himself as an alternative to Arias's 
hand picked successor, Chinchilla, who had publicly stated 
that she would continue the policies of the Arias 
administration if elected.  Some experts we spoke with 
immediately before the June 7 primary, including pollsters 
from CID-Gallup, believed that these factors, along with a 
well organized voter-mobilization push, might spur Araya to 
victory. 
 
¶5. (C) However, Chinchilla pushed through to a surprisingly 
comfortable victory, winning the popular vote by thirteen 
percent (55 percent to Araya's 42 percent, with former 
Minister of Public Security Fernando Berrocal winning the 
remaining 3 percent). We believe that her victory came about 
due to two major wells of support--women voters and those 
seeking continuity of the Arias period--as well as a bit of 
old-fashioned mud-slinging.  As the country's first female 
Vice-President, and the first female with a legitimate chance 
of becoming president, Chinchilla used a backbone of female 
supporters to power her campaign and present herself as a 
"new" political player--despite years on the political scene. 
 
 
¶6. (C) Additionally, by tying herself closely to the Arias 
government, Chinchilla was able to take a share of credit for 
the successes of the administration, and benefited from the 
Arias political machine's ability to mobilize supporters and 
resources.  Chinchilla also was very successful through 
surrogates, at hitting at Araya for alleged corruption 
 
(including linking him to disgraced former-president and 
current PUSC candidate Calderon) without it being linked 
directly to her campaign.  The end result was a smashing 
victory that confounded doubters and firmly positioned her as 
the front-runner in the general election. 
 
------------------------------------- 
PAC'S "CLOSED PRIMARY" DELIVERS SOLIS 
------------------------------------- 
 
¶7. (C) Despite challenges by two younger, fresher faces in 
the party (politician/economist Epsy Campbell and businessman 
Roman Macaya), quasi-populist PAC founder Otton Solis easily 
won PAC's "closed" primary on May 31.  Solis, who is running 
for president for the third time in a row, will be 
Chinchilla's major competition in the general election. 
While Chinchilla presents voters with an option for a 
continuation of the moderate, pro-trade policies of the Arias 
administration, Solis promotes a left-of-center, 
protectionist agenda which was highlighted by his vocal 
opposition to the CAFTA-DR agreement.  Solis still maintains 
that he would attempt to renegotiate the trade agreement if 
he were elected president. 
 
¶8. (C) In contrast to the PLN's open primary, PAC required 
that all would-be voters register with the party to be 
eligible to vote in the primary.  Perhaps showing the waning 
popularity of the party, just over twenty-two thousand voters 
participated in the primary, despite sixty-seven thousand 
actually registering to vote. PAC's turnout came in stark 
contrast to the more than five-hundred thousand Costa Ricans 
who took part in the PLN primary and meant that the PLN's 
third place finisher, Berrocal with, three percent of the 
vote, won almost as many votes as Solis. 
 
9 (C) If Solis hopes to have a chance at victory in 2010, he 
now needs to unite not just his own party, but also put 
together a wider "opposition coalition" to support him. 
While there have been signs that he might be able to bring 
together other leftist parties, he still faces a challenge in 
creating excitement for his (third) presidential campaign and 
finding a way to appeal to voters at a time when PAC appears 
to be losing steam.  Additionally, Solis is sometimes his 
campaign's own worst enemy, with frugal/austere political 
spending policies, a traditional skepticism of modern 
campaign styles (he eschews public opinion polls and new 
media) and a dislike for fundraising, which he views as 
damaging to the clean and ethical image he seeks to project. 
 
 
----------------------------------------- 
THE ONCE AND FUTURE PRESIDENT? NOT LIKELY 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶10. (C) The conservative Partido Union Social Cristiana 
(PUSC), the final major piece in the Costa Rican political 
scene, is a party in disarray.  While the party was in power 
only four short years ago, today some Embassy contacts 
question whether it will survive past the next elections. 
Deepening its crisis, PUSC party leaders (now down to mostly 
calderonistas) selected former-President Rafael Angel 
Calderon to be its presidential candidate at its June 26th 
national convention.  Calderon is currently on trial for 
corruption (charges widely believed to be true), and faces 
possible imprisonment if convicted. According to polls, over 
70 percent of Costa Ricans hold an unfavorable view of him, 
though most analysts concede that he could possibly win up to 
15 percent of the popular vote in 2010--if he's not a 
convicted felon before then. 
 
------------------------ 
MUCH STILL UP IN THE AIR 
------------------------ 
 
¶11. (C) While Chinchilla is widely considered to be the 
front-runner, the actual elections are nearly seven months 
away--plenty of time for mistakes to be made. Chinchilla will 
have to work to unite her own party behind her, and has 
already gone a long way in reconciling with Araya and his 
supporters.  Under an agreement the two former adversaries 
have reached, a number of Araya supporters will be included 
among PLN's National Assembly candidate list.  However, Araya 
recently put speculation that himself would run for a seat to 
rest, stating that his possibly candidacy stood in the way of 
any reconciliation agreement with Chinchilla.  Chinchilla and 
Araya have both publicly hinted at a possible ministerial 
 
post for Araya in a Chinchilla administration. 
 
¶12. (C) Solis will probably try and unite a number of small 
leftist parties behind his candidacy and work to develop a 
focus and effective message for his campaign.  Calderon, 
though unlikely to prevail, will probably focus on trying to 
win his court battle and then reviving his moribund party. 
In doing so, his goal will likely be to make a decent showing 
in the presidential elections, but more importantly pick up 
some National Assembly seats for his key supporters (his 
wife, Gloria Bejarano heads the list of PUSC National 
Assembly candidates).  Finally, all the candidates will 
choose their first and second vice-presidential running 
mates, and work on formalizing their party's candidate lists 
for Congressional seats.  In short, though Chinchilla begins 
the general campaign with an advantage, much could change 
over the next seven months. 
 
---------------------------------------- 
COMMENT: BETWEEN THE FUTURE AND THE PAST 
---------------------------------------- 
 
¶13. (C) Barring some unforeseen occurrence, the election 
should come down to a basic choice between Chinchilla and 
Solis, with the former looking ahead to "the future" and the 
latter gazing back towards "the past".  In the race itself, 
Chinchilla has a distinct organizational and financial 
advantage.  Her team has already been through a serious 
primary challenge, which forced her to hone her message and 
her tactics.  Her campaign relies on a host of modern polling 
and tracking data, makes use of robo-calls, hosts 
sophisticated real-time on-line chats with supporters and has 
a solid fundraising machine.  If Chinchilla does go on to the 
win, she would not only be the first female to hold the 
office, but also a welcome continuation of the Arias 
administration's U.S.-compatible policies.  Her election 
would provide needed continuity on a number of important 
policy fronts, from international trade and infrastructure 
development to public security and environmental protection. 
This would provide the USG it's best opportunity to continue 
pursuing our foreign policy goals in relation to Costa Rica, 
and see Costa Rica continue its role as a close U.S. ally in 
Central America. 
 
¶14. (C) Solis's path to the presidency relies in part on 
external factors.  His best chance of victory entails a 
criminal conviction for Calderon, which would leave Solis as 
the only viable alternative to the PLN and Chinchilla 
(describing the situation, one analyst we spoke with said a 
free Calderon is "the best friend the PLN has").  In this 
scenario, Solis might be able to siphon off votes from the 
hard-core PUSC loyalists, who would never vote for a PLN 
candidate.  Solis is also counting on appealing to the "anti" 
vote--made up of traditionalist Ticos resistant to change and 
skeptical about the transformations the country has gone 
through over the last 8-10 years.  Support from these sectors 
combined with support from PAC and other smaller parties 
might possibly be enough to push Solis over the top in 
February--or it might not.  While Solis came close to winning 
the last election in 2006 (losing by only one percent to 
Arias), he and his message have become a bit stale, 
especially in comparison to the "fresh" and "new" Chinchilla. 
 Solis' campaign, in comparison, is also fairly 
rudimentary--his campaign manager recently told us that he 
"thought he had convinced Solis to do some polling before the 
election this time", providing a stark contrast to the 
Chinchilla campaigns mountains of data. 
 
¶15. (C) If Solis were to somehow win, large question marks 
exist over how he would actually govern.  Taken at his word, 
Solis would attempt to renegotiate or even repeal CAFTA-DR, 
which might scuttle the agreement in its entirety.  But 
questions also abound as to what he would do in other 
sectors, including his stated distrust of international 
investment and what focus, if any, he would put on addressing 
Costa Rica's deteriorating security situation.  Regardless, a 
Solis-led government would be less predictable and less 
reliable in support of U.S. interests, and might again detour 
Costa Rica from its path towards socio-economic development. 
 END COMMENT. 
 
-------------------- 
ELECTIONS TIME-TABLE 
-------------------- 
 
¶16. (SBU) The following are the next key milestones for the 
 
2010 elections: 
 
8/7/2009   - Deadline for public officials to resign their 
             posts to run for a seat in the National Assembly 
             (Embassy sources report that Minister of Finance 
             Guillermo Zuniga and Minister of Justice Viviana 
             Martin are among those government officials 
             planning to resign and run for National Assembly 
             seats) 
 
10/1/2009  - General election campaigns legally begin 
 
10/23/2009 - Deadline for registration of presidential 
             candidates 
 
12/16/2009 - Start of two-week "Christmas Truce" in 
             campaigning 
 
1/7/2010   - Civil Registry finalizes the voter rolls 
 
2/4/2010   - Final day of official political campaigning 
 
2/6/2010   - Start of three-day prohibition on alcohol sales 
 
2/7/2010   - Election Day 
 
4/4/2010   - Second round of Presidential voting (only 
             necessary if no candidate wins more than 
             40 percent of the vote) 
 
5/1/2010   - First session of new Legislative Assembly begins 
 
5/8/2010   - Inauguration of new President 
 
 
BRENNAN