by Rod Hughes

Fact check: Presidents, when reviewing past accomplishments, tend to paint with a wide, rosy brush. But many times the press picks up a gilded lily but this time it was the Comptroller General’s Office that blew the whistle on one statement of President Oscar Arias’s State of the National address to the Legislative Assembly May 2.

The government does not devote 6% of the gross national product to education as the president stated and as law stipulates. This is no shame to the Arias Administration—no government has mustered a budget that devotes this amount to education since the law was passed making it a Constitutional article. In fact, the government gave 5% last year, according to the Comptroller General’s accounting. And even then, the Ministry of Education has only spent 4.75% of it.

Spokespersons for the ministry explain that it takes time to go through the legal hoops necessary to solicit bids for a new classroom or even a new school. So the funds sit in the bank until construction begins. Still, something seems wrong with the system when classroom roofs leak and children have no desk or other learning tools.

This is not the first time the Comptrollers have protested that the government has not met their constitutional quota. Just one year ago, Rocio Aguilar presented a case of unconstitutionality to the court. Naturally, the Arias Administration has come in for harsh criticism from the opposition party Citizen Action (PAC). Perhaps it merely proves that it is easy for lawmakers to set a goal for another branch of government.