Jorge Walter Bolaños wrote this article, which I am reproducing, as a sample of the depth and seriousness of the subject under discussion, and which makes it even more difficult for us to understand the Yes campaign. Mr. Jorge Walter is a former Minister of Finance, former CFO (Chief Financial Officer) of HB Fuller, and a very esteemed professor of mine, as well as of hundreds of Finance students at the University of Costa Rica.
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WHAT WILL THE NO TO FTAA ACHIEVE?
If we analyze a potential scenario in which the NO to the FTA is approved, it is very easy to anticipate certain consequences that such an act will bring to the country. Let’s see:
Closure of the CCSS. The NO to the FTA will cause the closing of many companies and the dismissal of close to 500,000 employees, according to experts. With this massive number of layoffs, the contributions collected by the Costa Rican Social Security Fund will be greatly reduced and it will be a mortal stab to the finances of the Fund, which will not be able to resist. First, the CCSS will not be able to provide medicines, then it will not be able to perform surgeries or give appointments, and later on, CCSS employees will be laid off and clinics and hospitals will be closed. The CCSS could never have been exposed to a coup with the consequences that this one will have. If anyone wanted to close the CCSS, here is the surest blow to your heart.
Closure of ICE. Nowadays, the Costa Rican Electricity Institute has been failing every day, with bad telephone service, corruption, inability to install telephones to those who request it and blackouts, and this causes dissatisfaction among users due to the lousy service. Citizens will not wait forever as slaves of such a lousy monopoly. Something urgently needs to be done, but now some, not content with having brought ICE to this precarious situation, are denying it, as the NO says, the lifeline that represents the necessary flexibility and openness that would help it provide users with better service. Finally, this denial of vital oxygen will lead ICE to its closure.
Closure of public universities. The flight of companies that will occur with the NO will cause that there will be no jobs for those who will graduate from the universities. Why are the universities going to graduate people if they are not going to get jobs? The most affected university will be the Instituto Tecnológico because its graduates are in technical disciplines, which companies will no longer demand. Inevitably, this Institute will have to be closed and then the closing streak will advance to the University of Costa Rica.
Emigration to Central America. The companies that close in Costa Rica will migrate to all the other Central American countries that have already said YES to NAFTA, and the unemployed Costa Ricans will have no choice but to look for work in those countries, abandon their homes and families and migrate in search of a salary, not of the quality they had in Costa Rica, but in order not to starve to death. The quality of life of Costa Ricans will suffer greatly because those who emigrate will have to live poorly in the country where they went and their relatives, mothers and children who will stay in the country waiting for the weak remittances of funds from those who left will live poorly. Insecurity and violence will increase in the country as never before.
Total impoverishment. Given the high number of unemployed, the closing of companies and the failure to attract foreign investment, the country will suffer the consequences of a shortage of dollars. The devaluation will multiply by enormous figures, even more than what happened at the time of the Carazo disaster. Inflation will be extremely high, and the impact will hit Costa Rica’s poor the hardest, many of whom, at that time, will also be unemployed. Hunger and misery will be our daily bread.
Closure of rural businesses. The flight of foreign investment, the very high unemployment, the enormous devaluation and inflation that we will suffer, besides affecting the poor to a greater extent, will cause no tourists to arrive, a business that the small farmer who supply the small rural hotels, which in turn employ so many Costa Ricans, live from to a great extent. All those small local businesses will have to close, and very soon.
Surrender of sovereignty. What some have failed to achieve in the past would be achieved this time. As we all know, dictators Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez have already given the order that NAFTA should not be approved in Costa Rica. By obeying them, we are handing over our sovereignty to them since we should be the ones to make our own decisions and not those dictators. I would not be surprised if Chavez has already given the order that the NO supporters in Costa Rica must wear little flags and red colors because that is his and Castro’s favorite color. I would not be surprised if vans of red t-shirts, left over from Chavez’s past street demonstrations, will soon arrive in the country.
We cannot surrender our sovereignty.
In these two countries the worst of extreme poverty is lived. In Cuba it is generalized and in Venezuela it reaches 40%. But there are rich people too. Castro’s fortune is estimated at $1 billion, according to Forbes magazine, and Fidel has not yet been able to deny this assertion. Chavez’s fortune is not yet known, but I believe it will soon be published. Why would we Costa Ricans want to sell our sovereignty and change our model towards one of these examples of such savage capitalism, in which everyone is impoverished to make a very few rich?
No wonder then that this surrender of sovereignty is immediately followed by the control of freedom of expression, the closing of newspapers and the oppression of the Church, which is lived in these two dictatorships.
Is it any wonder that there are so many foreign accents among the NO agitators: Catalans, Argentines, Uruguayans, Cubans and Venezuelans? Why so much interest of foreigners in meddling with the sovereign right to decide our destiny?
Superficiality cannot be the exclusive right of some clueless university rectors or university councils or of some former candidates or former presidents who have dedicated themselves to give false, biased or superficial arguments about the FTA.
We all have the right to contribute.
Article by JORGE WALTER BOLAÑOS.
Note: This article does not reflect my opinions about NAFTA. It is the independent opinion of its author.