Costa Rica goes to the polls with unprecedented levels of fragmentation and uncertainty

Daniel Zovatto, International IDEA

This Sunday, February 6, Costa Rica -the best quality democracy in Central America and one of the best in all of Latin America- will go to the polls to elect a new president -immediate re-election is not allowed-, 2 vice presidents and 57 seats of the Legislative Assembly.

Everything is organized so that the 3,541,908 voters go to the polls to cast their vote in a calm and festive atmosphere -despite the pandemic- as is the tradition in this small Central American country but with a firm democratic conviction. The Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE), one of the most prestigious Latin American electoral bodies, chaired for the first time by a woman (Eugenia Zamora) in its more than seven decades of existence, is the guarantor that the electoral process has high levels of electoral transparency and integrity.

In this contest, a hyper-fragmentation is observed when registering an offer, unprecedented and absurd, of 25 presidential candidacies.

According to the latest survey by the CIEP of the University of Costa Rica (UCR), only three candidates concentrate the majority of Costa Ricans’ intention to vote, but at the moment none of them exceeds 20% of vote intention.

This survey projects a sort of technical triple tie between former president José María Figueres Olsen (National Liberation Party, PLN) with 15%, former vice president Lineth Saborío (Christian Social Unity Party, PUSC) with 14% and Fabricio Alvarado (New Party). Republic, PNR) with 11%. This last candidate, Pentecostal singer and pastor, won the first round in the last presidential election (2018), but was later defeated in the second round by current president Carlos Alvarado.

Three other candidates appear in the aforementioned survey with an intention to vote higher than the margin of error, but below 10%: the leftist deputy José María Villalta (Frente Amplio); the former Minister of Finance of the current government, Rodrigo Chaves (Social Democratic Progress), and the former Deputy Minister of Transportation, Eliécer Feinzaig (Progressive Liberal Party).

The remaining 19 candidates have an intention to vote below the margin of error.

This electoral process is also characterized by a high level of uncertainty, since the percentage of undecided for the presidential elections amounts to 32% and reaches 47% in the case of the legislative ones, so everything will be defined on the last day . It is also unclear how this high level of fragmentation and undecided voters will affect the level of electoral participation.

This scenario poses almost as inevitable the need to go to a second round to define the next president (scheduled for April 3), since none of the candidates would achieve the 40% of the votes required by the Electoral Law to consecrate himself as president. in the first round.

It is relevant that two of the three main contenders for the presidency compete for political parties (Figueres for the PLN and Saborío for the PUSC), despite the fact that the trust of Costa Ricans in these institutions is 38%, according to the latest Latinobarometro report. 2021.

Similarly, the official candidate of the ruling party, the Citizen Action Party (Welmer Ramos), does not exceed the margin of error, which demonstrates dissatisfaction with the current government of Carlos Alvarado, as well as the eight years of the PAC (two governments followed) in power. Similar to other Latin American electoral processes, the ruling party will suffer a heavy defeat at the polls this Sunday.

At the legislative level, according to the latest survey by OPol Consultores, the new legislature would be made up of three large blocks: PLN would obtain 15 seats, PUSC 11, PNR 10 and other minority formations would share 9 seats.

The survey projects that 11 seats are likely to be disputed between the parties with the most voting intentions and several parties are likely to fade from the political map. This very fragmented distribution of seats anticipates that whoever is elected president will have to try to put together a broad government coalition with more than one political party to guarantee governability.

Regarding the main problems of the country, in the opinion of the citizens (according to the CIEP survey of the UCR) these are the cost of living, unemployment and corruption. Likewise, other issues appear as central in the electoral campaign: redistributive policies to attack the growing economic and social inequality, the deterioration of the fiscal situation, the economic slowdown, migration (especially Nicaraguan) and abortion. To this we must add the challenges faced by Costa Rican democracy, which, despite maintaining a high level of citizen support (71%), shows a marked drop in satisfaction with the functioning of democracy and a progressive increase in the dysfunctionality of the system. politician who has been dragging for more than two decades.

My opinion: the Costa Rican presidential and legislative elections this Sunday kick off the rally Latin American electoral 2022 that will continue in March and May in Colombia (election of the Congress and the Presidency respectively) and in October in Brazil (Presidency and Congress).

The Costa Rican electoral process, despite the challenges of organizing elections in times of pandemic, has been developing with a high level of normality, transparency and electoral integrity (as is customary in Costa Rican democracy) and, if our analysis is confirmed, it will be characterized by several of the prevailing trends in the region today: 1) strong vote punishing the ruling party; 2) high level of fragmentation and polarization; 3) need to go to a second round to define the Presidency; 4) a president without his own majority in a highly fragmented Legislative Assembly; and 5) as a consequence of this high level of fragmentation, the new president (regardless of who is elected) will have to face complex and challenging governance for the next four years.

At the regional level, the Costa Rican elections are a breath of fresh air, by reaffirming this country’s commitment to free and fair elections, to the defense of human rights and to democracy in a region -Central America- characterized (with the exception of Panama) due to a growing and serious democratic deterioration in three countries (El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras) and a brutal family dictatorship in Nicaragua. (OR)

Daniel Zovatto is regional director for Latin America at the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA).