One of the unions of the Supreme Electoral Court (TSE) and the Citizens Registry offered a press conference to defend the 320 hiring Authorized by the acting president, Blanca Alfaro. These hiring motivated an ongoing investigation in the Public Ministry (MP).
During the disintegration of the TSE Plenary, Alfaro authorized hiring for a period of two months. With the new integration of the plenary, it corresponds to the collegiate body authorizing a possible rectation.
Nevertheless, Observers of the electoral process of 2023 consider that these contracts could have as a background the payment of political favorsand question the real need for these positions.
Given these criticisms, Osbelí Urízar, general secretary of the Sittse union, described as “malicious” the publications that question the hiring. “We see the bad intention immersed in this press release, arguing fallacious issues, since the activity of the TSE is necessary to maintain the democracy of the country,” he said.
Urízar said he did not know the facts denounced before the MP and said there are solid arguments to justify hiring.
“This process was carried out following the established procedures, with an assignment of Congress specifically for it. Everything seeks to strengthen the institution,” he said. He added that, without these 320 people, the current staff “does not supply”, due to the workload in activities such as regulating and changes of electoral residence.
They will supervise assemblies
The citizen registration also supported the hiring, noting that The new staff will monitor the assemblies of political organizations during the coming months.
“We have an estimate of between 2,300 assemblies, between ordinary departmental and municipal, that the parties will celebrate,” said Deyanira Herrera, head of political organizations.
For its part, Sergio Antillón, director of the Citizens Registry, said that the recommendation to hire more municipal personnel has technical support. He explained that they made a diagnosis that included opinions of political parties.
“We concluded that it was necessary to increase the staff, basically in the municipalities (…), since a single subdelegate did not have enough time to cover all the assigned activities,” he said.
No definitive decision
On June 27, during a meeting between representatives of political parties and the plenary of magistrates, the acting president reported on the investigation related to the 320 hiring.
He affirmed that on the same day a plenary session would be held, since the integration of the plenary made it necessary for the case to be known by the highest electoral authority.
Since then, the magistrates have been summoned to plenary sessions, but, according to sources that requested anonymity, other issues have been addressed in these meetings, without so far a decision has been made on the hiring.