Legislative Candidates Sign
Transparency Agreement
By Amanda Roberson
Tico Times Staff
aroberson@ticotimes.net

Legislative candidates from San José and Heredia, north of San José, contending in the upcoming Feb. 5 elections signed a public declaration of their business interests Friday as part of the nonprofit Transparency International's initiatives to promote transparency and prevent conflicts of interest in politics.

Having candidates declare their ties to certain industries and companies is a way to prevent corruption and conflicts of interest between the political and business sectors, explained Alix Aguilar, Transparency International Election Monitoring Coordinator.

For example, “In the case of bids on contracts for public projects, it is often only the friends of the public officials involved in the project who know about them,” Aguilar said. “Others don't have access to the information.”

Legislative candidates came to the radio station Radio Eco, in San José, to sign the transparency declaration and were later granted a few minutes of airtime.

The declaration lists business areas, such as construction, transportation, real estate and insurance, each with a box next to it for candidates to check if they have interest vested in that area.

Asking candidates to disclose their interests and later monitoring elected officials' spending allows organizations like Transparency International to watch out for possible conflicts of interest, Aguilar said. If such a conflict arises, the organization brings it to the public's attention.

“Here, there are very few ways for people to really know what legislators are doing with money,” Aguilar said. “Monitoring them assures that they make their accounts public. They have to present a document with their income.”

Transparency International also held a transparency declaration signing for legislative candidates in Cartago, east of San José, Jan. 7.

The majority of legislative candidates attended this and Friday's events and signed transparency declarations, according to Aguilar, except candidates from the Social Christian Unity (PUSC) and Liberation parties, who were absent from both signings.

Transparency International announced Friday it will hold another signing at Radio Eco this Friday for those who could not attend the previous events.

While the organization is focusing its election monitoring efforts in the Central Valley, it hopes to continue expanding throughout the rest of the country in future elections, Aguilar said. Transparency International is based in Berlin, Germany and has been operating in Costa Rica since 1997.