With 14 parties running for the presidency, candidates backgrounds are as varied as their party lines. Presidential hopefuls professions include lawyer, journalist, historian, missionary and doctor; interestingly, all but four candidates have nominated women to be their vice presidents.
Election day takes place and despite political campaigns, televised debates and propaganda sprouting throughout the country, public interest in choosing the new president, vice-president and congress members has been lukewarm.
As this issue goes to press, former president (1986-1990) and Nobel Peace Prize winner Oscar Arias has a comfortable lead for his PLN (National Liberation Party) to win at the polls. Running a distant second in PAC (Citizens Action Party) delegate, Otton Solís.
Perhaps the most worrying statistics is that, according to a mid-campaign survey (Unimer for Newspaper La Nación), 39% of the eligible voting public indicated they might not bother to turn up to vote, threatening to make absenteeism the strongest contender of all. Only once before, in 2002, has voting gone to a second round, when no party won a majority of the vote.
Government 
