Candidates' election day
began with Catholic Mass


The major candidates for president began the day with a Roman Catholic Mass Sunday.

Only Ottón Solís was absent from the religious ceremony at the Catedral Metropolitana in San José because he attended Mass in San Isidro de El General where he grew up.

In San José, the candidates heard Hugo Barrantes, the archbishop, call upon the winner to take care of the poor.

Since Vatican II, there has been a time during the Roman Catholic Mass where those attending shake hands and sometimes share a kiss of peace.  At that point Sunday, the candidates, standing in the front row of the cathedral, turned and hugged each other in turn. Eugenio Trejos of Frente Amplio shared a hug with Laura Chinchilla of the Partido Liberación Nacional on his left. She in turn saluted Luis Fishman to her left. He is the candidate of Partido Unidad Social Cristiana.  Also sharing the friendly moment were Otto Guevara of Movimiento Libertario, Oscar López of Partido Accesibilidad sin Exclusión and Walter Muñoz of Partido Integración Nacional.

Then supporters of the candidates came forward in the church and joined in the hugs.

Ms. Chinchilla and Trejos later walked to the altar and received Holy Communion from the hands of Barrantes. Guevara also appeared to take communion a few minutes later with his fiancée. It turns out she took the communion host and broke it into two parts and placed half in Guevara's breast packet.  They then left for various points in their own motorcades to continue to rally the vote. The handling of the host raised questions in the Spanish media.

The Mass on the morning of election day is a tradition.

The day was sunny, and there appeared to be no weather problems associated with getting to the more than 6,000 polling places in the country. Major parties and some local and regional ones set up tents and displays at the polling places to provide information on their candidates. The bulk of the voting was in schools.

Saturday and Saturday night saw hundreds of vehicles decked with flags of the competing parities move through the streets of major population centers. Partido Acción Ciudadana, the party of Solís, even had a repainted bus with a representation of his face.

*This article is a reprint from the updated Sunday edition of A.M. Costa Rica.

Banco Nacional begins
to check customer data


Banco Nacional is in the process of updating the information of its account holders.

"Banco de Costa Rica did it last year, and we are doing it this year," said a bank manager Friday.

Banco de Costa Rica, also a state bank, won some negative public relations points when workers summarily closed accounts of those customers who did not present the proper paperwork or, as in the case of some expats, were simply out of the country.

Banco Nacional is sending out e-mails to addresses employees have on file. The e-mail gives the recipient 15 days to update the account. There is no indication of what the bank workers will do if the individual does not show. Updating involved visiting the bank in person with identification papers and a personaría juridica for companies operated by the customer.

This is part of the process whereby the banks try to comply with a law that says they should know their customers. The law seeks to prevent money laundering, but Banco de Costa Rica carried the requirement to extremes, even closing bank accounts for long-time customers who had very little money on deposit.


Hundreds evicted by Pavas fire


Fire tore through 40 dwellings in Rincón Grande de Pavas Friday. Firemen estimated that each dwelling housed six persons.

There were no reports of injuries or deaths. The call came in at 6:22 a.m., and the blaze was controlled an hour later, said the Cuerpo de Bomberos. Four pumpers and two tank cars responded to the alarm, as did 40 firemen.

Firemen termed the dwellings ranchos, meaning that they were less than standard construction. Such self-constructed dwellings of wood and sheet steel are vulnerable to electrical malfunctions and other fire causes. In this case, firemen said that a wood stove may have been the cause.

A.M. Costa Rica photos

Voice of America photo