President Pacheco to Give Declarations on Presidential Campaign Donations
President Abel Pacheco has said he will go before a commission to give details of his acceptance of a us$100.000 donation to his presidential campaign coming from the telecommunications company Alcatel and us$500.000 from the Taiwanese companies, Pacific Company and Sunshine.

Pacheco is scheduled to give his declaration next Thursday 2 December.

Luis Gerardo Villanueva, a Legislative Deputy with the Partido Liberación Nacional (PLN) has made a public call for information about the donations by Alcatel and the Taiwanese and will be the main questions he will put to Pacheco.

Alcatel made us$100.000 donations to the Partido Unidad Social Cristiana (PUSC), the political party that Pacheco, and former presidents Rodríguez and Calderón belong to, as well as contributions to the other political parties, including the PLN.

Luis Fishman, the second vice president under Pacheco's administration, was instrumental on arranging the dontation to the Pacheco political campaign in the last presidential elections and was paid through the company Servicios Notariales QC, the same firm tied to the payments in the Fischel-Caja and ICE-Alcatel scandals.

"President Pacheco has alway been transparent and never have any donations gone to a personal account", Federico Vargas a deputy for the PUSC party, told the press.

Public Sector Vacation Period Announced
The government announced this week the Holiday vacation schedule for public sector employees which will see many public offices closed between 20 and 31 December. However, since January 1 (a Statutory holiday) and January 2 is a Sunday, public employees won't return to work until 3 January 2005 at the earliest.

The vacation schedule can vary with various government organizations, like the Judicial courts who will work through mid day December 24 and return the week of January 10.

The situation worsens as some public sector employees have accumulated vacation times and days off, who will normally used them up during the holiday season. A general rule of thumb you should hold off any government business during the period of December 15 to January 15.

Private sector employees will have the December 25 and 26 and January 1 off as Statutory holidays, however, most offices will close from the December 24 to January 3. Retail stores will be open during this period, rotating schedules and giving employees time off during slower periods.

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Costa Rica Will Take its Youth Team to UNCAF Cup Costa Rican coach Jorge Luis Pinto announced Wednesday that he will take the second-string team to the Cup of the Central American Soccer Union (UNCAF). No first-team players having taken part in the qualifiers for Germany 2006 will be involved in the UNCAF Cup. Instead, the team for this tournament will count with the participation of young players never summoned to the national team, said Pinto. Pinto, who presented on Tuesday his work plan for 2005 before the National Teams Commission and the Executive Committee, said he will maintain an intelligent strategy not to saturate the players with an excess of matches. In view of the multiple matches of the national team, what is wanted is to give continuity to the group of players for the three coming international games, he pointed out. The UNCAF Cup will take place on February 19-27, 2005, at the Guatemalan capital, with the participation of the national teams of Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. The next three matches of the Costa Rican team include a qualifier for the Germany 2006 World Cup, on February 9, the UNCAFCup, and the Gold Cup.