by Rod Hughes
A group of dissidents fiercely opposed to the Central American Free Trade Agreement grandly announced yesterday that it refused to recognise the legitimacy of the Constitutional Chamber of the Supeme Court and the Supreme Elections Tribunal that will supervise the vote Oct. 5 in a nationwide referendum.
In many other Latin American nations, such an announcement might be viewed as a prelude to widespread unrest. But in Costa Rica, with its long history of citizen respect for institutions, it is more surprising than frightening.
Calling itself the Comision Nacional de Enlace , it is made up of many of the same people who angrily announced before the 2005 elections that if pro-CAFTA candidate Oscar Arias were reelected, they would not recognise his legitimacy as Chief Executive. (After a year in office, President Arias still has not been turned out of the Casa Presidencial, the Tico equivalent of No. 10 Downing St. or the White House, so Costa Ricans are not too worried about such threats.)
Chief among the dissident group is a union of Electrical Institute (ICE) workers, afraid that CAFTA would break up parts of the governmental telecommunications and phone monopoly, and thus jeopardise their jobs. But the group also claims to also represent some 29 other organizations of farmers, ecologists and students.
Statements by the group yesterday cast aspersions on the honor of the five magistrates of the Supreme Court who assented to the constitutionality of the trade treaty.