Alliance for Responsible Trade

Manipulation and Pressure Tactics win the CAFTA Referendum

October 9, 2007

By Tom Loudon, Alliance for Responsible Trade

With the final polls predicting a resounding win for the opponents of the CAFTA referendum last Thursday, the U.S. government and the business elite in Costa Rica pulled out all the stops. In spite of a law which explicitly prohibits all public discussion of the issues in the two days before the referendum, the law was fragrantly and systematically violated by the press; especially several TV stations which ran one "news" program after another designed to instill fear in the population if they voted against CAFTA.

One program featured a 1 ½ hour interview with President Arias, elaborating the multitude of negative consequences rejecting CAFTA would bring. Additionally, a high level Arias cabinet member filled the "news" programs with analysis around the doom Costa Rica would face if CAFTA were not ratified.

All of the threats coming from the U.S. government received wide coverage in the media here. The one which had the most impact was a White House statement on Saturday, the day before the vote, affirming that if CAFTA were rejected; there would be no re-negotiating a new treaty with Costa Rica. Given that the Bush administration is practically a lame duck government, and can't predict the actions of the next administration, there is no validity to this statement. Nevertheless, it was effective in spreading and amplifying the well rooted campaign of fear administered by President Arias and his team.

These fraudulent tactics helped turn last weeks significant margin for the "NO" campaign into a narrow victory for the pro-CAFTA forces. With over 1.5 million votes cast (75% of the voting population), only about 50,000 votes gave the "Yes" campaign their victory (51.6% to 48.4%). A victory gained through such deliberately orchestrated and blatant violation of Costa Rican electoral law that it provides grounds to declare the referendum null and void. But the Costa Rican Supreme Electoral Council failed to act in the moment, when challenged to do so, and continues to be silent, something which demands a questioning of their impartiality and credibility as an independent body.

Still gathering concrete evidence, there are reports of grave violations in many locations across Costa Rica. In a place called Turrialba an accusation was made that people from the "Yes" campaign were calling community members to "participate" by offering them 30,000 Colones, or about $60.

The Citizens Action Party denounced that the mayor of Guapiles, together with people from the "Yes" campaign, broke into the "NO" campaign headquarters, beat up people inside and destroyed a computer.

While these are important, and demand being denounced, the central abuse was planned, organized and systematically carried out at a much higher level. To date this has been completely ignored; and the obviously partial Supreme Electoral Council has been delegitimized. This failure to act by the Supreme Electoral Council must be denounced and their authority challenged. With the country divided down the middle, and the base of the "NO" campaign so highly organized, a failure to nullify the results of this referendum could lead to grave consequences.

From the time this propaganda blitz began, leaders from the "NO" campaign made formal demands to the Election Authorities that the propaganda be stopped, or that the stations be shut down. Those demands were completely ignored. The neutrality which should be central to an authority of this nature was missing from the equation. As an international observer I and others denounced this abuse.

In response, the Alliance for Responsible Trade is mounting an international organizational sign-on letter campaign to the Organization of American States (OAS), demanding that they declare the results of this referendum null and void. In the U.S., we deeply understand the consequences of stolen elections. Given the complicit role of our government in the corrupting the process, we owe it to the people of Costa Rica to demand their right to vote freely without foreign interference.

The elation of a people standing up for their rights which we witnessed at multiple polling places on Sunday has been replaced by dread and disillusionment. Today people from the "NO" campaign are in shock. They didn't expect there estimated 55% lead would be lost in the final days. Once the shock has passed, this dread will turn into coordinated and coherent action. We must continue to support them in their struggle for justice. For more than twenty years Costa Rica has succeeded in resisting many of the prescribed economic reforms imposed by the North and international institutions, providing an alternative model of development that has clearly worked. Costa Rica and the world have too much to loose if this model of development is unraveled by the greed of the transnational companies and their client state, the U.S.