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Costa Ricans took to the streets in opposition of state oil company, public unions, taxes, and waste

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Hundreds took to San Jose’s Plaza de la Democracia (Facebook)

Hundreds took to San Jose’s Plaza de la Democracia (Facebook)

November 9th, 2015 (ICR News) Hundreds of Costa Ricans took to San Jose’s Plaza de la Democracia this weekend to call for an end to the state-owned oil company RECOPE’s fuel monopoly, as well as to protest alleged abuses by public-sector labor unions, calls for new taxes by the Solis administration, government waste, and corruption.

 

The protest was organized by three separate groups via social media.

 

The main organizers, a group started on Facebook known as Referéndums por Costa Rica announced that the group would seek a national referendum in order to amend certain articles of the Constitution, including changes to the way that legislators are elected to the country’s Legislative Assembly.

 

“We will continue to protest.  A referendum where the people speak is the most democratic way to address the sort of wasteful spending that occurs today in government,” said Carlos Ugalde, a spokesperson for the group.

 

Mauricio Sanchez, creator of the group known as No Mas Recope (No more RECOPE) that also participated in Sunday’s protest, stressed the need to end the current monopoly of the state-owned oil company.

 

Sanchez’s group says it demands that the country no longer depend on an institution that threatens to paralyze the country when its demands are not met, referring to RECOPE workers refusing to distribute gasoline, diesel and even jet fuel during a mass public sector union strike on October 26th.

 

Sanchez’s group says it is not calling for the elimination of the state-owned company, rather only its legal monopoly on hydrocarbon sales, saying that competition would force RECOPE to “improve and become more efficient.”

 

The third group, Costa Rica a la Calle: Ya no más Impuestos (Costa Rica to the Street: No More Taxes) said that in addition to supporting the causes of Referéndums por Costa Rica and No Mas Recope, that its members are outraged by calls for new taxes by the Solis administration amidst excesses in the collective agreements between public sector labor unions and the government and excessive compensation, benefits and bonuses paid to public employees.

 

Protesters also expressed their disapproval over what they consider wasteful government spending.

 

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  • prdatki

    Good for them , and it is about time! Thank La Nacion for publishing the pay and many other thing these criminals have gotten away with. Now execute the top 10 % jail at very hard labor another 20 % and audit the rest. Cut all benefits to elected and appointed officials!

  • costarick

    I do hope that the momentum of the Referendum Movement started yesterday in the Plaza de Democracia can be sustained by the various groups involved. I believe that their objectives present the only viable solutions to Costa Rica’s economic problems currently experienced.

  • Yeims

    Very refreshing news for a change !

  • gc

    the totalitarian leftest political class will crush them like bugs then claim it was moral to do so. it will start with claims that they are the low info stupid people of society that are tools of corporations.

  • http://www.AnimalsBigandSmall.com Maxine deVillefranche

    I am pleasantly surprised by this demonstration by the people of Costa Rica. I believe that there are too many monopolies on services provided by government employees, that these same government employees’wages are much too high as compared to other countries as well as the wages earned by employees in the private sector. I hope that something good will come out of these demonstrations.

  • Jimmy Kirk

    This is good to read today.
    Growing very tired of hearing how the union organized protest are acting as terrorist and holding the citizens for ransom every time they want more money for less work, especially RECOPE!

  • Ken Morris

    Interesting, but I wouldn’t bet any money on this coalition prevailing.

    A group organized against RECOPE probably only draws members from the quarter or so of Ticos who drive. I doubt that the other three-quarters give a flip.

    Worse, since many of those affluent enough to drive are members of public employees’ unions, and the demonstration was also against them, the anti-RECOPE bunch probably draws from an even smaller slice of the population.

    A group organized against tax increases probably draws from an even smaller demographic, since except for the VAT and maybe a nuisance tax here and there, there aren’t any proposals in the hopper to increase the majority of Ticos’ taxes.

    Meanwhile, if the photo is any guide, we’re dealing with an older demographic than is the norm. No doubt these folks are more active and influential on the average than others, but prevailing with a small base seems unlikely.

    I’m not sure about the third group, but it’s only a third of a few hundred. Plus, although a good idea, changing the way legislators are elected isn’t likely an issue that excites the masses.

    It’s all an interesting demonstration though, just strikes me as more of a man-bites-dog story than the start of a popular movement.

    • costarick

      You’re quite right that a campesino is unlikely to walk, or ride his, or her horse to the voting booth to cast a vote against RECOPE, nor a Public Sector employee to cast a vote against the established “gravy train” of wages and benefits currently being paid to them. However, I would suggest that the most motivated group of voters that will vote in any Referendum held on the various topics set-out in this article will be from the Private Sector and particularly from those groups who were protesting on Sunday in the Plaza de Democracy. It is quite possible that a majority of voters who would choose to vote in a Referendum would come from those groups and it will only take a majority of votes to determine the result of any Referendum held, not a majority of Costa Ricans voting to decide the outcome.

      • gc

        read his post more closely and you will read it is the classic the people are stupid and the movement is supported by the rich to not pay necessary taxes. well taxes are not needed, they are destructive and those marchers are smarter than any academic leftest would ever hope to be.

      • Ken Morris

        Slow down.

        The way I read the article, only one of the three groups is calling for a referendum, and it evidently seeks various unspecified constitutional changes. Can the constitution can be amended via referenda? I seriously doubt that it can be, and as a matter of political philosophy, don’t think that any consititution that can be amended by majority vote (super majorities may be another story) is worth the paper its printed on. The whole point of a constitution is to is to lay out a foundation for the republic sturdier than the temporary sentiments of even a majority. It looks to me like this group is just another populist bunch who imagines it so thoroughly embodies the will of the people that it ought to be allowed to amend the constitution by mere popular vote. I doubt it can, and predict it would be sorry if it could, since that just opens the floogates for other populists bunches to amend the constitution to their liking.

        Anyway, what we lack is information about any specific, legal referendum that any of these groups are proposing–and the referendum would have to be specific as well as legal. You can’t after all have a referendum on a cluster of issues; you would have to have multiple referenda. Perhaps, I don’t know, a referendum on the existence of RECOPE would be possible, and maybe even one capping taxes (although this would be hard to write, since there are a zillion different kinds of taxes). However, until we see a specific proposal for a legal referendum on the table, we really can’t predict its chances of passing.

        So maybe one or another legal referendum would pass, but we aren’t to the point to having anything specific enough to offer an opinion. And that was partially my point. All we have now is an interesting expression of diffuse anger from a loose coaltion of small groups we don’t usually see demonstrating. They don’t however appear to have their act together very well, or to be as representative of the people as they wish.

    • Larry Worsham

      I think you’ll find the number considerably higher. In 1995, when we bought our finca in Tres Equis de Turrialba only a few of those in our pueblo had vehicles of any kind. By the time we sold the property in 2009 at least half of the households owned either an automobile, truck or motorcycle. We’ve visited a few times since and that ratio still exists.

      It is refreshing to see the protests against the public sector unions and also to note that this was done in a park, not in the middle of a busy thoroughfare, as is common with ICE, Recope, the teachers union and UCR.

      • Ken Morris

        I’m pretty sure the ratio is 25/75, and I can’t imagine that the price of gas is a huge issue for motorcyclists. However, if waged smartly, a movement against RECOPE could win a majority. Gas prices affect non-motorists too in bus and cab fares, costs of delivery passed onto them, etc. Plus, there’s the general issue of bloated, spoiled government agencies. Non-motorists could be brought on board, I think. The difficulty is just that it wouldn’t be as salient to them as it is to the folks who say goodbye to the better part of a Ben Franklin when they fill up their tanks.

  • richard schlinder

    It is time for RECOPE to get competition.

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