In her living room, Priscilla Herrera safeguards, alongside Vaquita, her mixed-breed dog, hundreds of ballots for Sunday’s elections in Costa Rica, where citizens are entrusted with helping ensure the transparency of the process. It is a singular case in Latin America, where electoral materials are usually stored in warehouses under the watch of soldiers and police and, even so, accusations of tampering are common.
Costa Rica, which abolished its army in 1948, leaves this responsibility to its citizens. “It’s really nice that the people also look after the elections. In other countries the army protects the ballots like a treasure because there can be fraud. Here, no,” Herrera, 42, told Agence France-Presse from her small home in San José.
A school cafeteria worker, she received a backpack containing 600 ballots after being randomly selected by the Tribunal Supremo de Elecciones (TSE) as an assistant at a polling station. Along with other witnesses, she checked that the ballot papers for president and legislators were complete, signed a report, and took the sealed package home on a motorcycle. It is secured with a plastic tie and weighs about 16 kilograms.
Even on foot
Taking advantage of the short distance between polling places and their homes, some assistants carry the bundle on foot, like Gabriel Marín, who feels honored by the responsibility. “I feel really good about the trust they place in citizens. We recognize that, since we’re all part of the process, it’s impossible for there to be fraud,” said Marín, 32, an employee at the state-run University of Costa Rica.
Although he lives in a safe part of the capital, Marín makes sure to lock his front door and set the bag on a high chair next to the living-room television, in case a water pipe were to burst and damage the materials. The ballots can even be kept by the poll workers designated by political parties.
On Sunday, Herrera and Marín will take the materials, including the ballot boxes and the crayons, to their polling stations. The word “fraud” has practically disappeared from presidential races in Costa Rica, which prides itself on being one of the continent’s most stable democracies.
Paradoxically, it forged that strength through a bitter episode: the 1948 civil war, triggered after Congress annulled a presidential election over alleged irregularities. The conflict lasted 44 days and left hundreds dead, but years later it led to an agreement that laid the foundation for social welfare policies that endure to this day.
Herrera says the ballots are safe in her home, where she also has guards of her own: Vaquita, two dachshunds, and a cat.
