Solis: Corruption is the cause of the country’s problems

December 3rd, 2012 (InsideCostaRica.com) Ex-presidential candidate, Otton Solis, said that the country’s current situation, including the poor state of infrastructure, a high fiscal deficit, financial problems plaguing institutions such as the Costa Rican Social Security System (CCSS) and many others, is the result of corruption which prevents Costa Rica’s politicians from making decisions.

“The level of corruption is the cause of the government’s problems in this country, and the root cause for which decisions are not made rapidly and are not executed. There are a lot of people – journalists, opposition and citizens (investigating), but the investigations are very slow,” Solis said.

“The dysfunctional democracy is rooted in corruption,” he added.

Despite the fact that some in government have said that the obstructions in decision making are the fault of the opposition, or the press, Solis disagrees.  He also says that creating new laws will not solve the problem.

Solis said that the protests over the last few weeks, and the general discontent of citizens with the government and its recent decisions, are only an example of the level that corruption has reached.

“The country is growing at a 2.6% rate – that is the average rate of the past 20 years- with that result, in order to double the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), we’d have to wait over 27 years, and in order to reach the level of an underdeveloped country such as Chile, 17 years would have to pass, and 50 years in order to reach Spain’s economy – even with its current crisis level. Economically, we have the highest deficit in Latin America, and the country is not spending what it should on health, education, infrastructure, security, science, technology and sports,” said Solis.

Solis bases his statements on studies such as the United Nation’s Human Development Index, which indicates that Costa Rica is growing at the slowest level in Latin and Central America. Likewise, the Gini coefficient, which measures the distribution of income, indicates that as of 1990 Costa Rica has shown the worst performance in Latin America.

“The social areas were sacrificed for international competitiveness, which in turn allowed us to have a massive deficit in exports and imports, and we have the worst numbers in the social aspect in Latin America; we are still above (other countries), but because of what was done in the past, others are quickly catching up with us,” said Solis.

Solis questions Costa Rica’s economic and social policy over the last 20 years. “They can’t fix the bad things because they have no moral authority (…) a president can not give a minister orders because he implicitly has threatened (the president) with what he knows (…) that’s why people take to the streets, because they can’t put up with the corruption anymore.”

“We are all upset about what is going on, that nobody is held at fault, and that no one takes responsibility. Inefficiency is married to corruption; there are so many cases of the National Liberation Party (PLN in Spanish) placing inefficient people in important positions because they know politicians’ secrets. The protests are a sign that the population no longer believes anything, and still, the same people come and want to govern again,” he said.

Lastly, Solis said that Costa Rica must follow the lead of wealthy countries such as Korea, Singapore and Taiwan in social, economic, and institutional policies.

“The (need) is to have a Government with ethics, that is able to talk to this country…weak governments can not improve because they have no morals. We need to end the marriage between high officials and abuse of power. There is a need to invest in science and technology, and a major need to invest in education. We are only investing 1.38% of GDP in science, which is half of the average in Latin America, and if we compare ourselves to successful countries that invest 3%, we are doing pretty bad,” he added.

When asked how the government should come up with such funding for science while the country is running such a deficit, Solis said taxes needed to be increased.  “(Tax) increases should be made in a progressive manner, meaning to charge more to the richer,” he concluded.