The economist Rodrigo Chaves became the new president-elect of Costa Rica this Sunday, after prevailing with almost 53% of the votes compared to 47 for former president José María Figueres in the second round, who registered an abstention of more than 40 percent of the electorate.
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He is considered an “outsider” or practically unknown in the national political life of Costa Rica, since most of his career was spent abroad, and since his launch as a candidate he has dedicated himself to attacking the previous management of the traditional parties. of the country, including of which he was a part. One of his campaign slogans is “tidy house”.
Chaves is an economist by profession who has already passed through the Government of the now outgoing Carlos Alvarado and has been involved in several controversies since his time at the World Bank, while being recognized as someone with a high academic profile after obtaining a doctorate in Economics at Ohio University in the United States and receive a scholarship from Harvard University to study poverty issues in Asia.
The future president of Costa Rica assures that the accusations against him, due to events that occurred between 2008 and 2013, were what he called jokes that were misunderstood due to cultural differences, however the World Bank demoted him from his position as executive for considering that he was beyond jokes.
In that international institution he became director of the office in Indonesia.
I have called the President Elect, @RodrigoChavesR , to express my congratulations, make an orderly transition and express my best wishes in the tasks that you will face as president number 49 of Costa Rica. Congratulations Costa Rica for a new democratic day ����!
– Carlos Alvarado Quesada (@CarlosAlvQ)
April 4, 2022
In Costa Rica, however, until now he was only known for his fleeting stint as the country’s finance minister for just six months, in the Alvarado government, in which he tried to revive a seriously affected country’s economy in the midst of the pandemic with several measures that caused controversy, among them a tax on income greater than the equivalent of 7,500 dollars.
Chaves made the fight against corruption one of his flags, for whose rise he blamed previous governments and in that sense he proposed attacking it through a plan that would reward those who denounce these acts with money and penalize those who do not.
He also stated his intention to apply State reforms through a referendum if necessary. Among others, he spoke of a package of executive decrees to make services and basic goods cheaper, which he has just ratified in the first statements to the press on Monday morning.
In his last days of campaigning, Chaves approached the evangelical sectors by signing an agreement with some of their representatives in which he promised to eliminate the so-called gender ideology in the educational system.