Power or Influence?

by crv.staff
06.02.10
6:13 PM UTC

Filed in Costa Rica

Originally published in The Vibe, December 2009, By Marcel M. Pfister

Asked who the most powerful person on the planet is, the obvious answer is the President of the United States of America. Barack Obama presides over the only remaining superpower with the most powerful army and the largest economy in the world. So, if the President of the United States is the most powerful person in the world, who is the second most powerful person? Again, the obvious answer is the Vice President of the United States of America, since, hierarchically, he is second in line and would assume full powers if something happened to the number one position.

However, who has the most influence over the president? It is most likely his wife, Michelle. After all, they share the pillow talk and chances are that she has more influence over her husband than any other person. In the race for the presidency of Costa Rica, a recent study revealed some interesting results in terms of whom the candidates listen to most and subsequently, are most likely to be influenced by.

For Laura Chinchilla of PLN it is her husband José María Rico, her father Rafael Chinchilla, Alicia Fournier, a close friend and former member of the Legislative Assembly, her personal assistant, Irene Pacheco, and René Castro, her campaign manager. It is interesting to note that both her vice-presidential candidates do not figure on this list.

It is very well known that Shirley Sánchez has a tremendous influence on Ottón Solís Fallas, her husband and presidential contender for PAC. Other people with major influence on don Ottón are Elizabeth Fonseca, a PAC Member of the Legislative Assembly, Francisco Molina, his campaign manager, Victor Morales, a former minister and friend, as well as Sonia Marta Mora, his communications consultant.

Otto Guevara Guth of the Libertarian Movement is most influenced by Mario Quirós, one of his two vice-presidential candidates, Danny Quirós, his communications manager, Roger Retana, a political analyst and consultant, Patricia Pérez, ML’s secretary general and a Member of the Legislative Assembly, and Carlos Gutierrez, the head of the ML party faction in the National Assembly. His girlfriend Deborah Formal, daughter of the owner of San Pedro Mall, does not make the list at all.

Luis Fishman Zonzinski, the official PUSC candidate who replaced the recently convicted Rafael Ángel Calderón Fournier, is known to be influenced most by his politically active wife, Aida Faingezicht Weisleder. Other people close to him are Iris Zamora, one of his vice-presidential candidates, Orlando Morales, his planning and campaign manager, as well as Humberto Vargas, his other vice-presidential candidate.

It is interesting to see that not all the candidates are necessarily closest to their self-chosen vice-presidential candidates. Informal influence tends to outweigh formal power. Here is an illustrative, albeit fictional story, in that context: Bill and Hillary Clinton drive up to a gas station and Hillary recognizes the gas station attendant as one of her ex-boyfriends. She gets out of the car and has a brief conversation with him. Back in the car, Bill says to her: “Just imagine, if you had married him, you’d be the wife of a gas station attendant!” Hillary looked at Bill and replied: “No. He’d be the President of the United States!”

Whether leaders are made, or self-made, they are all subject to public scrutiny. A CID-Gallup poll assessed the perceived performance of President Óscar Arias and his government. A full 58% of Costa Ricans polled gave Arias a good to very good rating, whereas 24% evaluated him as neither good nor bad and only 4% rated his performance as outright poor. Asked who was the best performer among the members of his cabinet, María Luisa Avila, Minister of Health, drew the highest score with 23%, his brother, Rodrigo Arias, Minister of the Presidency (roughly comparable to the US President’s Chief of Staff) 18%, and Leonardo Garnier, Minister of Education, came in with only an 8% share.

About 100 days before the election, Laura Chinchilla led all the polls with 55% before Otto Guevara Guth with 15.7%, Ottón Solís Fallas with 12.3%, Rolando Araya Monge with 3.7%, Luis Fishman Zonzinski with 1.5%, Óscar López with 0.6%, and Eugenio Trejos Benavides with 0.2%. Five percent claimed to be undecided and 1.4% had no intention to cast a vote at all. None of the above polled 4.6% and 1.9% refused to respond the survey.

If these figures hold, then Laura Chinchilla can look toward an easy win in the first round on February 7, 2010.

Rating 3.00 out of 5