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RHMFISS/HQ USSOUTHCOM MIAMI FL
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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 SAN JOSE 000023 
 
SIPDIS 
DEPT FOR WHA/CEN 
AMEMBASSY BRIDGETOWN PASS TO AMEMBASSY GRENADA 
AMEMBASSY OTTAWA PASS TO AMCONSUL QUEBEC 
AMEMBASSY BRASILIA PASS TO AMCONSUL RECIFE 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 2015/02/09 
TAGS: PGOV KDEM PREL PINR PLN CS CH CU VE KWMN
SUBJECT: CHINCHILLA WINS: COSTA RICANS CHOOSE CONTINUITY 
 
REF: 10 SAN JOSE 110; 09 SAN JOSE 815; 10 SAN JOSE 19; 10 SAN JOSE 3 
 
CLASSIFIED BY: Peter Brennan, Charge d'Affaires; REASON: 1.4(D) 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary:  Laura Chinchilla won Costa Rica's February 7 
presidential election, promising continuity and consolidation of 
the Arias Administration's agenda.  The USG's top notch 
collaboration with Costa Rica will continue with the new 
government, as Chinchilla's policy goals coincide with ours and she 
has strong personal ties to the U.S.  The President-elect aims to 
improve citizen security - her top priority - and take concrete 
steps toward Costa Rica's ambitious environmental and energy goals. 
She will face the task of addressing domestic obstacles to trade 
and investment.  Chinchilla's National Liberation Party (PLN) won a 
plurality in the Legislative Assembly, but she will be challenged 
to put together a working coalition in this fragmented body.  The 
USG should encourage Chinchilla to continue Costa Rica's 
constructive engagement on global issues; otherwise, we can expect 
the GOCR to diminish its activism on climate change, human rights, 
disarmament, etc.    End Summary. 
 
 
 
A Decisive Victory 
 
 
 
¶2. (SBU) Laura Chinchilla handily won Sunday's presidential 
election with just under 47 percent of the vote, beating by more 
than 20 points Otton Solis from the Citizen Action Party (PAC) and 
Otto Guevara from the Libertarian Party (ML).  (They garnered 25 
and 21 percent, respectively.)  Chinchilla won almost 6 percentage 
points more than Oscar Arias did in 2006, showing that the 
candidate charged with being his "puppet" could surpass her mentor 
and earn her own clear mandate.  Chinchilla's victory was 
dramatically more decisive than that of Arias four years ago, when 
he defeated Solis by only one percent of the vote, as the bulk of 
the opposition this year divided between PAC and ML. 
 
 
 
¶3. (SBU) ML's rise, at the expense of PAC, came more as a result of 
Guevara's populist campaign focused on security, rather than a 
shift to the right on the part of Costa Rican voters.  Luis Fishman 
from the Social Christian Unity Party (PUSC), which held the 
presidency from 1998-2006, earned only 4 percent of the vote; 
however, PUSC maintained and even added to their numbers in the 
Assembly. Almost 70 percent of the electorate voted in the 
elections, a 4 point rise from the historic low turnout of 2006, 
and the first rise in voter participation in twelve years. 
Observers from the embassy, the Organization of American States and 
a U.S. Federal Elections Commissioner found the elections to be 
free and fair. 
 
 
 
Madame President 
 
 
 
¶4. (SBU)  In electing Chinchilla, Costa Ricans voted for continuity 
and consolidation of President Arias' agenda.  Arias has been 
criticized for setting lofty goals without putting in place the 
mechanics to reach them (e.g. achieving carbon neutrality by 2021). 
In contrast, we expect Chinchilla to eschew grand new 
pronouncements and put her nose to the grindstone to move the 
agenda forward.  Chinchilla brings a significant career in public 
service to the office, including stints as Legislative 
Assemblywoman, Minister of Public Security, and President Oscar 
Arias' former Vice President (she resigned upon declaring herself a 
candidate for the presidency).  Though she does not project the 
public charisma of most politicians-a fact reflected in her 
often-lackluster campaign-she is an intelligent and competent 
technocrat who has surrounded herself with experienced advisors. 
She will be Costa Rica's first female president. 
 
 
 
Strong Relationship with U.S. 
 
SAN JOSE 00000023  002 OF 004 
 
 
¶5.  (SBU)  The USG's top notch collaboration with Costa Rica will 
continue under the new administration.  Chinchilla's policy goals 
coincide with ours, and she has strong personal ties to the U.S., 
having earned a Masters in Public Policy at Georgetown on a USAID 
scholarship and worked on judicial reform in Latin America as a 
USAID contractor in the late 1990s.  Chinchilla told us during the 
campaign that she would seek U.S. assistance in her efforts to 
strengthen citizen security, particularly in improving the 
recruitment and training of uniformed police officers.  One of her 
close advisers told us late last year that Chinchilla would be 
interested in working on a women's issues agenda with Secretary 
Clinton. 
 
 
 
Chinchilla's Priorities 
 
 
 
¶6. (SBU) Chinchilla has said she will make improving citizen 
security her top priority.  Security issues took center stage 
during the campaign, as Guevara and the ML relentlessly attacked 
the Arias administration and Chinchilla for their failure to 
effectively deal with a rise in crime and drug trafficking over the 
past four years.  Though the government almost doubled the public 
security budget over the past two years (and saw a small drop in 
some crime stats from 2008 to 2009), Chinchilla has promised to add 
an additional $100 million per year for police funding.  Among 
other initiatives, she plans to establish a senior position focused 
on combating organized crime and narcotics, expand gang prevention 
programs, and open a new police academy.  Chinchilla comes into 
office with a strong background on citizen security issues; in 
addition to her experience as Vice Minister and Minister of Public 
Security, she has written a number of papers on police reform and 
justice administration.  She has attended security seminars in the 
U.S., including a National Security Plan development seminar run by 
the Center for Hemispheric Studies in 2007. 
 
 
 
¶7. (SBU) As part of her effort to promote jobs, Chinchilla will 
work to consolidate gains of the Arias administration on economic 
issues.  Arias' team negotiated a number of free trade agreements 
(FTAs), including CAFTA-DR and soon to be concluded FTAs with 
Singapore, China and the European Union.  However, business leaders 
charge that hyper-bureaucracy and inadequate training of government 
officials interfere with their ability to take advantage of these 
trade opportunities.   Chinchilla will face the task of addressing 
such obstacles to trade and investment.  Another major hindrance to 
trade and investment is Costa Rica's deteriorated physical 
infrastructure.  Aware that the government has insufficient 
resources and capacity to meet these needs, Chinchilla's 
administration will move forward with concessioning out the 
Limon/Moin port complex (Ref A) and encouraging other 
public-private partnerships in infrastructure. 
 
 
 
¶8. (SBU) Chinchilla also has promised to focus on environmental 
issues, specifically on achieving environmental sustainability and 
advancing a clean energy policy.  The Arias administration has 
failed to turn much of its rhetoric on the environment into action 
(such as Costa Rica becoming carbon neutral by 2021), and 
Chinchilla recognizes that it falls to her administration to 
implement concrete measures to achieve such goals.  An early 
challenge on this path will be the passage through the Legislative 
Assembly of a long-overdue energy bill, which Chinchilla should use 
to reform the energy sector to effectively promote clean energy. 
 
 
 
 Challenges in the Legislature and in her Party 
 
 
 
¶9. (SBU) Chinchilla's first task is trying to put together a 
working coalition within the Assembly that can effectively conduct 
business.  Chinchilla's administration will have to work with a 
Legislative Assembly that is more divided than at any point in 
 
SAN JOSE 00000023  003 OF 004 
 
 
Costa Rican history.  Though final results for the Legislative 
Assembly have yet to be released, the PLN won a plurality, 
capturing at least 23 of 57 Assembly seats (NOTE: there remain a 
small number of seats in play as elections officials finish 
tabulating all votes cast).  PAC came in second with at least at 
least 10 seats, followed closely by ML with 9, PUSC with 6 and 
Accessibility Without Exclusion Party (PASE), which focuses on the 
rights of the disabled and appealed to poorer voters, with 4 seats. 
The remaining seats were split among a number of smaller parties. 
 
 
 
 
¶10. (SBU) It will require Chinchilla's leadership to turn the 
Assembly, which has been decidedly less than productive over the 
past four years, into an effective legislative body. The ML and PAC 
in particular have been difficult for the PLN to work with in the 
past, a fact which is unlikely to change now, as each party tries 
to establish itself as the voice of the opposition.  Yet with 13 
votes split among PUSC, PASE and other smaller parties, the PLN has 
more options for potential partners than in years past.  However 
Chinchilla, who had a reputation for being somewhat aloof during 
her term in the Assembly, will now face the challenge of uniting 
disparate interests to form some sort of consensus on important 
legislative issues. 
 
 
 
¶11. (SBU) Another challenge for Chinchilla could come from within 
her own party, as many PLN Assemblymen and party officials owe 
their allegiance to President Arias.  Oscar Arias still wields 
tremendous power within the PLN, and the worst kept secret in Costa 
Rica is that his brother, Rodrigo, has designs on the presidency in 
¶2014.   Chinchilla might at some point either have to accommodate 
or stand up to Arias, but for now they generally espouse the same 
goals for the country and ideas on how to achieve them. 
 
 
 
Foreign Policy 
 
 
 
¶12. (C) Chinchilla has yet to fully espouse her foreign policy 
goals, as the presidential campaign almost exclusively focused on 
domestic issues.  In conversation with us in October, she seemed to 
have given little thought to foreign affairs beyond Costa Rica's 
relationship with the U.S.  Senior Ministry of Foreign Affairs 
officials told us during the campaign that all of the candidates 
seemed to expect that foreign policy would run on "automatic 
pilot".  We expect Chinchilla to defer to her advisors, possibly 
including President Arias, on foreign policy issues. 
 
 
 
¶13. (C) We do not anticipate Chinchilla will reverse - or intensify 
- any of Arias' foreign policy initiatives, such as opening 
diplomatic relations (albeit very cool) with Cuba or recognizing 
the "State of Palestine".  Relations with Venezuela are likely to 
remain distant and the rapport with Nicaragua frigid.  While a 
Chinchilla administration is unlikely to continue courting China 
actively, as did President Arias, it probably will continue 
initiatives that are underway (e.g., concluding/implementing the 
free trade agreement).  In addition, it may well respond favorably 
to Chinese offers of assistance and/or sweet commercial deals, 
similar to Costa Rica's January 2009 award of a USD 235 million 3G 
telecommunications deal to Chinese firm Huawei.  Foreign Ministry 
colleagues tell us that the Funes Administration in El Salvador is 
exploring opportunities to learn from Costa Rica's experience in a 
number of areas of governance; we imagine a Chinchilla 
administration would be receptive to such collaboration.  Relations 
with Panama and Colombia almost certainly will remain strong. 
 
 
 
¶14.  (C) Costa Rica's potentially diminished attention to 
international issues would be a loss for the U.S., since the 
country has been an articulate advocate of constructive positions 
on matters such as climate change, human rights, and disarmament. 
This embassy will encourage Chinchilla and her administration  to 
continue - and increase - Costa Rica's engagement on these and 
 
SAN JOSE 00000023  004 OF 004 
 
 
other  issues where it can provide leadership.  (Costa Rica is 
currently a candidate for a seat on the UN Human Rights Council, 
where it could serve as a positive voice and a valuable U.S. ally.) 
We urge Washington officials to deliver the same message to 
Chinchilla and her team as opportunities arise. 
BRENNAN