Voting kicks off in Costa Rica presidential elections
San Jose, Feb 6 (EFE).- Costa Rica’s 6,767 polling centers on Sunday opened for 3.5 million eligible voters to elect the president and the 57 lawmakers for the period 2022-2026 term.
The voting centers will close at midnight GMT with the first results being expected to be published by the Supreme Electoral Tribunal a few hours later.
A record number of 25 candidates are running for the presidency in elections that are most likely to go to a runoff, scheduled for 3 April, according to polls.
Although elections are taking place in the midst of a fourth wave of Covid-19 infections, the court defended positive patients’ right to vote.
Incumbent president Carlos Alvarado encouraged people to vote after he cast his ballot in western the capital San Jose.
“We are in one of the strongest democracies in the world and we call on everyone to go to the polls to exercise their right to vote and to do so with great joy,” he told journalists afterwards.
“I wish Costa Rica a beautiful day of success for the candidates,” added the president, whose term ends on 8 May.
Alvarado voted after testing negative for Covid-19 at the end of a preventive isolation period after his wife Claudia Dobles was infected. EFE
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