Nicoya group threatens
more pressure for bill


The Movimiento Rescatemos Guanacaste. Has given the president 15 days to put a bill the organization favors on the list for legislative action.

The bill calls for a vote in Nicoya to create the Cantón La Península.

This is the same organization that joined with rice farmers Monday to block the Interamericana highway in Abangares. The group promised more pressure tactics if President Laura Chinchilla did not include the measure in the legislative agenda.  During certain times of the year, lawmakers can only consider bills authorized by the president.

The threat was over the signature of Carlos Alberto Chanto C., identified as being in charge of communications for the group.

The canton would include that part of the central Cantón de Puntarenas that is on the Nicoya Peninsula.

Right now residents of Tambor, Cóbano, Paquera, Lepanto, Montezuma and other communities have to go to the administrative center of the central canton to conduct official business.  In the proposed legislation, the Tribunal Supremo de Elecciones would be required to set up an election for mayor and regidores within six months of the measure's passage.

The idea of making the southern part of the Nicoya peninsula its own political district has been floating around since the 1980s. But now 29 lawmakers have signed on to the measure, which has been voted out of a special commission that was set up to study the concept.

That the president will put the measure on the agenda is unlikely. Lawmakers have been devoting most of the time to a proposed new tax that the president wants desperately.

The group said that about 500 persons participated in the Monday demonstration.


Money-laundering hearing
set for today in San José


A preliminary hearing is scheduled to begin today in the money laundering case of Carlos Howden Pascal, the former president of the Limón professional soccer team.

The case is being prosecuted by the economic crimes office. The hearing is in the Juzgado Penal del I Circuito Judicial de San José. As part of the proceedings, a date for a trial might be set.