Thousands in Costa Rica protest U.S. trade pact

Source: reuters

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of Costa Ricans, some dressed as skeletons and holding banners, protested on Sunday against a U.S. trade pact they say will flood the country with cheap farm goods and cause big job losses.

Chanting "No to the free-trade pact!" and "Costa Rica is not for sale!" protesters ranging from farmers to housewives filled one of San Jose's main boulevards to demonstrate against the Central American Free Trade Agreement with the United States.

Costa Rica is the only country that has not ratified CAFTA -- which includes Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic -- and will be on October 7 the only nation to decide the issue by referendum.

The referendum has split the nation, with Costa Rican President Oscar Arias and some businesses saying CAFTA will bring investment and jobs. Opponents say it will mean a flood of cheap agricultural imports and limit the country's sovereignty by taking investment disputes to international arbitration.

. . .

A poll last week by the daily La Nacion showed the "yes" side ahead in the referendum by a slim 50.6 percent to 44.7 percent margin with a 3.8 point margin of error.


Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/30/AR2007093000750.html

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CAFTA will provide:

* Research findings on Costa Rico native species will belong to BigPharma

* Water/natural resource privatization. Businesses' access to the water and natural resources, and their "right" to profits take precedence over any measure (whether human or social) that might be taken by the government or municipalities.

* Multinationals to take ownership of seeds and of traditional knowledge of plants and animals.

* Phone/insurance/public services. Multinational companies maintain the right to sue the state for means which they may consider "equivalent to expropriation" or which "affect their profits"—restrictions or regulation in those areas thereby preventing the state from maintaining them under public dominion

* CAFTA does not guarantee labor rights; except in five specific instances, the country is committed to prevent violations "if commerce is affected". That is to say, if it harms the transnational companies and not if it harms the workers.

* The ability to legislate is handed over because CAFTA puts itself above all national laws so no new law can be approved—nor can those in place retain their vigilance—where they contradict CAFTA.

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http://americas.irc-online.org/am/4575

Free trade is not fair trade, and I would be protesting too.

We were at least 120,000 people (probably more than 150,000) from all over the country, and this was probably the biggest demonstration in Costa Rican history (we have to wait until the helicopter photos come out). Next Sunday we will vote on whether to approve or reject CAFTA, and this was our victory demonstration... definitely a big success, hopefully a sign of things to come.

I'll post more pictures when they come out, and I will also make a picture thread in the Latin America forum as soon as people send their own pictures.

Here's hoping the message is getting out past your government's propaganda program.

You are the richest nation in the Caribbean and the only Caribbean nation not part of CAFTA. It doesn't take an Einstein to connect the dots.

He was in Seattle in 1999.

And of course, he was supporting us :)

see all of the people out against CAFTA. I hope to god they get rid of it by referendum. Costa Ricans get it.

in Costa Rica to hit the streets! That's quite an accomplishment! Fab protest!

What kind of vote counting system does Costa Rica have? Any worries about a stolen election? The stakes are very high.

So in a way it is a fraudulent referendum, there's no public financing and their campaign accounts are closed, etc. But we all knew it was going to be that way.

They wouldn't be able to steal it though... this will be the most heavily watched election ever, the NO movement wanted to register at least 15,000 poll watchers but we finally registered over 27,000. They would never dare to steal it, and even if they did, we will be there to stop them.

from the people who didn't attend the demonstration. Media outlets are good at trying to ignore things like this these days.

One more week. Best wishes for the victory which will benefit the people. Just say "no" to CAFTA!

Thank you, arcos. Hope we'll be celebrating with you next Sunday.

They are not ignoring us. They just can't. Sure, La Nación (the biggest media outlet, and the biggest promoter of the right wing agenda) was kind of "light" when talking about it, refusing to estimate how many people were there. Of course, last time they did an estimation, they said we were 25,000 when we were actually closer to 90,000. But now that we were over 150,000, it is kind of hard to deny the facts, so sometimes it is better to ignore them. :)

We will be celebrating... I'm pretty hopeful we will. And I will let you guys know before the media starts spewing bullshit.

Please keep us updated. My fingers are crossed.

(Incidentally, my favorite coffee comes from Costa Rica.)

:hi:

I hope the people win.

from Canada! I wish we had your gumption here.

Mind you I think they have every right to reject bad business, and should... however aren't they one of the protectorates that refuses to go one way or the other? Shit or get off the pot!

I'm tired of people (and countries) that want it both ways. If they are a protectorate they are stuck with our laws, and what we decide, if they are a state, they get representation, and can do something, or if they are a separate country completely, they can just say piss off. But IIRC like PR they are a middle ground, where they enjoy protectorate status, but no responsibilities, I say "wah"!

That aside, I hope this does them good. It's horrible the trade policies that are being push on all of us so a few rich white guys can steal all our money (and NOT reinvest hardly a cent back into the economy).

God willing cafta will be stopped and rejected. One can only hope!

Puerto Rico is an island, we are not. Puerto Rico is a protectorate, we are a very independent nation and have been so for nearly two centuries.

And just in case you ever meet a Costa Rican, don't even dare to call him "Puerto Rican". Personally I'm not offended by your confusion, but the average Costa Rican would be VERY pissed off.

The US has so many random protectorates...
In that case I hope your government does the populist (IE what the PEOPLE want) thing and rejects this trade rape bill!

These huge numbers are being shit upon by the 1% corporate elitist pigs all around the world. Why are we letting THEM run OUR lives? Let's put the 1% in their place..once and for all..behind bars where they belong.

Thanks so much for this thread!

I wish I saw aerial shots of the march in DC on 9/15.. there were some on the huge on in NYC years ago. It really shuts up the bs about the turnout on the news.

you don t know what it s like!

It's a beautiful country with great folks and an interesting, dangerous looking but courteous traffic pattern...

I LOVE the place and pray that el Pueblo de Costa Rica can keep the wolves away!!!

CAFTA is nothing but NAFTA on Steroids...

It seems to me that this is not a win/lose election on global corporate predation in Costa Rica. It will be great if the fascists lose the vote, but what if they win? Are all these people going to go quietly into servitude?

The election has rallied the troops, inflamed the populace, stirred up grass roots organizing, and has educated people and spread the word. CAFTA and the government that pushed it are going to have nothing but trouble from now on--whether they win this vote or not--but especially if they win it. In a country like Costa Rica--small, and with fairly good democratic institutions--I don't see how the government can proceed with such a 50/50 split in the country on fundamental policy, especially with the anti-CAFTA side so well-organized and so strongly against it (for so many good reasons).

Questions about the voting system: Is it electronic? Has it been privatized with "trade secret" programming code? Is there a ballot for every vote, and how are they counted? And if it's electronic, what percentage of the votes are actually counted?

This could be very important, especially in a close election. You can have hundreds of poll watchers (and kudos to you for getting so many volunteers! Wow!), but WHAT will they be watching? Black boxes, or real vote counting?

There have been plans to implement electronic voting, but thankfully they have failed (for now).

Results will probably be known 3 or 4 hours after polls close because unlike general elections where we have 3 ballots with multiple choices, in this case there's only one ballot with two choices... it makes for easier counting.

What happens if they win? Well, that's certainly a very good question. Actually, it wouldn't be much different to the situation if we actually won... there's lots of work to be done to actually keep this awesome structure that we've built... this is the first time in history that all progressive and left-leaning forces are working together in a well oiled machine. Although there's one very important left of center party, there are several others, as well as lots of organizations and individuals who have refused to come together. This forced us all to come together, so hopefully it won't be a missed opportunity to actually give Costa Ricans a choice.

We are suffering the horrors of fascism for having not done so here.

In Venezuela, they have electronic voting, but it's an open source code system--anyone may review the code by which the votes are tabulated--and they handcount a whopping 55% of the ballots as a check on machine fraud. Here, incredible as it seems--with 'TRADE SECRET' programming code, owned and controlled by Bushite corporations--many states have a ZERO handcount, and the best states handcount only 1%. Our system is made to order for election fraud.

One can judge a system by its results, too. We have El Stupido for president, and Venezuela has a president who reads Noam Chomsky. I'd say that an open source code system, with a 55% handcount, is fairly safe against stolen elections, but after what has happened in the U.S., profound distrust of electronic voting is warranted.