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COSTA RICA'S LEADING ENGLISH LANGUAGE NEWSPAPER

Blue Water, Lake or Shore Fishing: Guanacaste Has the Base

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THE province of Guanacaste offers visiting and local anglers some of the best fishing in the country for both inland and ocean species.

Before its closure (see separate story, S-12) Flamingo Beach Marina on the northern coast was the base for the largest number of charter boats. Now boats are primarily based at nearby Tamarindo, Ocotal, Playas de Coco and Playa Carrillo. A couple of boats also operate out of Nosara and Samara.

For the inland angler, 22-mile-long Lake Arenal, most of which lies in the province of Guanacaste, abounds in tackle-tearing rainbow bass (guapote, in Spanish), with top guides and fast bass boats ready and waiting for fishermen, and there is a full-range of hotel accommodations around the lake in all price ranges.

The newest player in that area will begin hosting lake anglers within the next few weeks aboard the Rain Goddess, Dr. Alfredo Lopez’ luxury houseboat that formerly operated on the San Juan River.

Alfredo has moved the houseboat, with accommodations for up to 12 people, to LakeArenal, where it is being refurbished. I will have more on that in a future Tico Times fishing column.

THE Tempisque, Bebedero and other small rivers that etch the map of Guanacaste can also provide excellent freshwater fishing, depending on the time of year and water levels. One of my first trips after moving here in 1983 was with guide Peter Gorinsky, fishing my 12-foot inflatable on the BebederoRiver, and we loaded up on small snook and corvina.

But it is the blue-water fishing on the Pacific that brings most anglers to this country, and there’s hardly a month that doesn’t provide great fishing someplace along the Guanacaste coast.

BEST fishing generally begins about January at Playa Carrillo, as the fish begin spreading north, continuing through April or May. Some of the charter boats out of Tamarindo and Flamingo often move to Carrillo when the northerly winds slow action in their areas, or run their fishermen south of Cabo Vela, where they’re protected from the winds.

April through early September usually provides the best fishing for anglers out of northern Guanacaste, who can fish the Murcielago and Catalina Islands or move out to the blue water for some of the best action in the world for blue, black and striped marlin; sailfish; dorado; tuna; and wahoo.

Those who prefer fishing from shore can try throwing sinking crank baits, spoons or hair jigs with a plastic trailer or working natural baits from along the beaches, river mouths or the estuary at Tamarindo for corvina, snapper and the occasional snook. I have even caught roosterfish from the beach as they chased in a bait school.

 

N.Y. Production Arriving in Costa Rica’s Southern Zone

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THE newly formed Dominical Little Theatre is producing The Fantasticks, an off-Broadway musical that played for more than 40 years in New York’s Sullivan Street Theater and around the world.

The international cast includes Costa Rican nationals and is slated for a run of six shows at the Hotel Roca Verde from April 26 to April 28 and May 2 to May 4.

The May 3 show will mark the 43rd anniversary of the show’s opening at SullivanTheater.

FOR more information, call Michael Witte at the Hotel Roca Verde at 787-0036 or read about the cast and crew at www.domincal.biz/theater

 

Guatemalan Mayas Unite for Change

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GUATEMALA (AFP) – Approximately 300 Guatemalan indigenous leaders on Monday organized the first National Assembly of Representatives of the Maya, which seeks unity to combat the discrimination aboriginal ethnic groups face in that country.

“In essence, the Assembly is a space to call for unity and combat discrimination and racism. We are doing this because we are not included in the government’s policies, because the State is fascist and excludes us,” said Juana Batzibal, leader of the Maya Consultation Commission.

HOWEVER, more than words are needed to eliminate discrimination, she said. It must be done “through policies, and if policies are going to be multi-cultural, obviously, the attitudes of government officials have to start changing.”

Batzibal recognized the first challenge is “to get the policies that are created as a result of the creation of the Assembly approved by the Guatemalan Congress. For this to happen, it’s fundamental the  government give it political recognition.”

ACCORDING to Batzibal, if the Guatemalan government has the political will, it could immediately recognize the Assembly. This would be possible under Convention 169 of the International Labor Organization (ILO), which guarantees respect for the culture, religion, social and economic forms of organization and identity of indigenous peoples. Guatemala ratified Convention 169 on June 6, 1996.

Four delegates from each of the 22 Maya peoples that inhabit Guatemala will be part of the Assembly.

The members of the Assembly will meet on a bimonthly basis. They also plan to create a consultation group that will meet more often.

The Xincas and the Garífunas, minority indigenous groups that are not Maya, will participate as observers without the right to vote.

 

Momentum Grows Against Child Sex Trade

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COSTA Rica is gathering its forces against the sexual exploitation of children and attacking the problem on three fronts: in the tourism industry, in the courts and on the streets with special police units.

The Public Security Ministry is training police in methods to prevent commercial sexual exploitation of minors and plans to upgrade its sex-exploitation police unit to a full-fledged agency by the end of the year.

Child advocacy group Paniamor is working with the court system to unify computerized information systems and create a national registry of victims and perpetrators.

Employees of hotels, car rental agencies and taxi drivers have received training to recognize and report those who ask the wrong kinds of questions or appear to be involved with child prostitution.

“We want to say to those people who pay $50 or $100 for sex with children and adolescents that while our children have value, they do not have a price,” said Milena Grillo, executive director of Paniamor, a private organization that since 1989 has worked with the community, businesses and government to prevent violence against children.

ON Wednesday, 520 police officers graduated from an intense workshop focused on preventing commercial sexual exploitation of minors, the Security Ministry announced.

The workshop was part of a joint effort between the ministry and the non-governmental organization Defense of Boys, Girls and Adolescents.

“The fact that police are trained in these themes is of great importance, as it educates the officer in the adequate form of intervention in cases of sexual violence. We are now talking about police that are more sensitive and professional to act on these types of problems,” said Vice-Minister of Public Security, Ana Helena Chacón.

Thirty of the officers were of the rank Comisionado, the second-highest rank in Costa Rica’s police system. They will be sent to the provinces of San José, Heredia, Cartago and part of the Caribbean province of Limón, to act as regional chiefs.

The vice-minister said she hopes future workshops will be held for police in Limón,  as well as Golfito, in the Southern Zone, and Quepos, on the central Pacific coast.

PANIAMOR and the president of the Costa Rican Association of Auto Renters (ACAR) and director of Elegante Payless Car Rental, Gonzalo Vargas, signed a code of conduct earlier this month.

The signing ceremony was the culmination of three months of work training 50 Elegante Payless employees.

Elegante and three other car renters in the association, which includes 15 rental companies, have committed to helping stop child prostitution in Costa Rica.

The others will come along “one by one,” Vargas said.

“ELEGANTE invites every one of the tourism businesses in our country to join this important effort – without fear, without limits,” he said.

“As businesses and as people, this is one of the most important decisions that we have made in the last several years,” he added.

Headed by Paniamor and funded in large part by Fundecooperación, a Dutch- Costa Rican development program, the ambitious project aims to bind 130 tourism businesses around the country into a united front against child sexual abuse.

It began in August 2003, and hopes to train at least 3,000 people by the project’s end-date, February 2005, according to Paniamor representative Maria Guillén.

So far, she said, 12 businesses are involved and 450 of their personnel have been trained.

The 250 cab drivers of Taxis Unidos, the only cab company licensed to operate at JuanSantamaríaInternationalAirport near San José, signed the conduct code in late January (TT, Jan. 30).

EVERY business involved should display the project’s logo, in English or in Spanish, on all their promotional materials.

Damaris Arrieta, with Fundecooperación’s Sustainable Tourism Program, said preserving “cultural resources,” including children, is as vital as preserving natural resources when it comes to the tourism industry.

“This is a very accelerated way of combating this problem – converting people into agents of combat by training them,” she said.

The majority of child sex offenders are Costa Rican, not foreign, Grillo said.

“However, foreigners invest a large amount of money in the exploitation of children.”

THE flow of people into the country seeking illicit sex with minors (adult prostitution is legal in Costa Rica) is motivated by the idea that they can do so with impunity because of a lack of Costa Rican law enforcement, she said.

However, “that is not true. It is more difficult here than in other Central American countries. The people who come here looking for (illegal) sex are mistaken,” Grillo said.

PAUL Chaves directs the sexual exploitation police unit in San José. Since 1999, it has operated with 10 officers, all based in the city.

By year’s end, he said, the unit should become a full agency with 60 to 70 officers operating nationwide specifically to combat sex abuse.

With $250,000 in U.S. government financial assistance and pending government approval, Chaves will begin recruiting, training, and outfitting the officers as the director of that agency.

The money is half of $500,000 donated by the United States last year to combat child sex exploitation in Costa Rica (TT, Feb. 28, 2003).

The other half, designated for prevention, will go to Costa Rica’s Child Welfare Office.

GRILLO said Paniamor also has been working with the Judicial Branch on a project to create a new information network for prosecutors around the country.

She said Paniamor will submit its plan to the Judicial Branch in May.

As of January, each province outside of San José created a new prosecutor’s office dedicated solely to sex crimes and family violence.

The proposed system, once approved, would permit shared information about cases and court rulings between prosecutor’s offices as well as Interpol and national police forces, Grillo said.

The system would register the victims, alleged or convicted sex offenders, and list the places where each crime took place in order to map places of higher risk.

 

Poll: Two-Thirds of Ticos Support CAFTA

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NEARLY two thirds (64%) of Costa Ricans polled recently said they are in favor of the Central America Free-Trade Agreement (CAFTA) with the United States and slightly more than half (54%)

said they believe it will benefit the country.

Approximately one in five people surveyed believe CAFTA will be detrimental to the country (18%), and a similar number (18%) said deputies should reject it, according to a poll released last week by Unimer and the daily La Nación.

The new poll marks an increase in support for the free-trade pact, compared to September 2003. Since then, the number of CAFTA supporters has increased by 7%, while the number of opponents dropped by 7%.

Costa Ricans with a college education are more likely to support CAFTA than those without it. People under 30, people in the middle- and upper-income brackets and people living in the greater San José metropolitan area are also more likely to support CAFTA, according to the latest poll.

Nearly three quarters (73%) of those polled said they were informed about CAFTA, while the remaining 27% said they were uninformed.

The poll was conducted between Feb. 23 and March 3 and claims a margin of error of 2.6%.

 

Environment Tribunal Orders Marina Closure

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LAST week, the Environmental Tribunal ordered the Municipality of Santa Cruz to shut down the Flamingo Marina, in the northwestern province of Guanacaste, for the second time in six months.

In its resolution, the administrative tribunal criticized Mayor Pastor Gómez for allowing the marina to remain open, and stated that under no circumstances will boats be permitted at the site. The tribunal requested the cessation of all activities in the marina.

The tribunal, part of the Environment and Energy Ministry (MINAE), began investigating the marina last year after reports of alleged water pollution at the site. When the municipality failed to present an environmental plan to deal with the problem, the tribunal called for the marina’s closure in October 2003.

Despite that ruling, the marina continued to operate (TT, Dec. 12, 2003). Alexandra Gutiérrez, administrative director for the Municipality of Santa Cruz, told La Nación last week that all activities at the marina have been suspended pending an environmental impact study.

 

Convicted Official Back in Court

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FORMER Labor Minister Farid Ayales had to appear in court in the city of Alajuela yesterday to testify before a judge who will determine whether the former official will serve the remainder of a four-year prison sentence under house arrest or be sent back to prison.

The judge was given five days to make a decision and had not done so by time The Tico Times went to press.

The prosecutor’s office this week requested Ayales’s benefit of house arrest be revoked after the convicted minister was discovered in a bar Saturday in San Juan de Tibás, north of San José, according to Judicial Branch spokeswoman Sandra Castro.

Ayales said he stopped in his friend’s business while out of the house for a doctor’s appointment because he was feeling bad, Castro said.

Ayales was sentenced to four years in prison for selling work permits to Nicaraguan immigrants for ¢5,000 ($11.75), Castro said. Such permits are free. He began serving his sentence in March 2003.

Three days after he began serving his sentence, he was hospitalized for leukemia, La Nación reported. After five months in the hospital, a San José court said he could serve the remainder of his sentence under house arrest.

The conditions of his house arrest included a requirement that Ayales inform authorities in the prison system 24 hours before any doctor appointment, and 24 hours after a medical emergency.

Authorities reported justification for the Saturday appointment was received on Monday.

 

Water Rates Increase 36%

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THE rates the Water and Sewer Board (AyA) charges its customers increased by 36% last week. The rate hike was approved by the Public Services Regulatory Authority (ARESEP) and published in La Gaceta, the government’s official publication, the daily La Nación reported.

ARESEP also approved an additional 6% rate increase that will go into effect in January 2005. These measures will apply to AyA’s 500,000 customers.

As of now, the amount paid by a fivemember family for an average of 29 cubic meters will increase from ¢3,343 ($7.87) a month to ¢4,501 ($10.59). In 2005, that same family will pay ¢5,654 (approximately $12.29 taking into account the colón’s expected devaluation against the dollar).

Proposed increases total 42% – significantly less than the 78% increase AyA had originally requested.

As a condition for the increases, ARESEP is requiring AyA to ensure the quality and supply of water.

Before AyA can request additional rate hikes, it must improve its billing system and begin issuing regular reports on its performance.

 

Taxi Fare Hike Gets Approval

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TAXI prices will increase ¢25 (6 cents) for the first kilometer and ¢15 (4 cents) for additional kilometers because of higher gas prices, according to the Public Services Regulatory Authority (ARESEP).

ARESEP approved the increase in cab fares, the first since June 2003, following a request by the National Federation of Taxi Cooperatives.

Prices will increase from ¢240 (56 cents) to ¢265 (62 cents) for the first kilometer, from ¢135 (31 cents) to ¢150 (35 cents) for additional kilometers in the San José metropolitan area and from ¢140 (33 cents) to ¢155 (37 cents) for additional kilometers outside of San José. An hour of waiting time also will increase from ¢1,020 ($2.40) to ¢ 1,120 ($2.66).

The rate hike will go into effect after the new fares are published in the official government newspaper La Gaceta, which should happen in the next few weeks, ARESEP officials said.

ARESEP did not approve a request for a return to higher nighttime fares, which were eliminated in 2000.

 

U.S. Boy Dies in Horse Accident

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AN 8-year-old boy – a U.S. citizen – was killed last Saturday in the northwestern province of Guanacaste, according to officials from the Judicial Investigative Police (OIJ).

Henry Cromwell, the victim, fell from his horse while riding in Vijagua de Upala, about 50 kilometers northeast of Liberia, and apparently hit his head, police said.

He was admitted to the emergency clinic of the UpalaHospital at 6 p.m., and was pronounced dead soon after. No other information was available at press time.