Miguel Ángel Rodríguez
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| Miguel Ángel Rodríguez Echeverría | |
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| In office 8 May 1998 – 8 May 2002 |
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| Preceded by | José María Figueres |
| Succeeded by | Abel Pacheco |
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| Born | 9 January 1940 San José, Costa Rica |
| Political party | PUSC |
Miguel Ángel Rodríguez Echeverría (born 9 January 1940) is a Costa Rican economist, lawyer, businessman, and politician. He served as President of Costa Rica from 1998 to 2002 and was briefly Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS) in 2004, before stepping down and returning to his country to face allegations of financial wrongdoing during his presidential tenure in Costa Rica. He is currently awaiting trial for corruption charges.
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[edit] Early life
Rodríguez was born in San José. From an early age he distinguished himself as a talented, hard-working, and ambitious student. At the University of Costa Rica he obtained degrees in both economics (1962) and law (1963) and worked there briefly as an assistant professor of economics. He then attended the University of California, Berkeley in the United States, where he received both M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in economics in 1966. His thesis work was on monetary policy. Immediately after graduating he returned to Costa Rica to serve as Minister of Planning and member of the board of directors of the Costa Rican Central Bank during the government of president José Joaquín Trejos.
In the 1970s and 1980s Rodríguez combined his academic work as a professor of economics at the University of Costa Rica and at the Autonomous University of Central America with a business venture in cattle holding: Grupo Ganadero Internacional, S.A. A devout Roman Catholic and a believer in free enterprise, Rodríguez earned a reputation as an important conservative intellectual. (His brother, Álvaro Rodríguez, currently serves as Superior General of the De La Salle Brothers) He was elected to Costa Rica's legislative assembly in 1990 and served as president of that body from 1991 to 1992.
[edit] Presidency
Rodríguez ran three times for president: in 1990 he lost his party's nomination to Rafael Ángel Calderón. In 1994 he won his party's nomination but lost the election to José María Figueres. He finally secured the presidency in 1998. In spite of his previous record as an economist and businessman, his presidency was generally regarded as ineffectual. Proposed free-market reforms, including a plan to end the state monopoly on telecommunications, fell apart under opposition from the trade unions of government employees and other groups, but he was successful in reforming the retirement system and opening it to private participation as well as giving in concession to a private company the operation of the main port in the Pacific Ocean (Caldera). After his term of office, Rodríguez worked as a consultant at Manatt Jones Global Strategies and as a visiting professor at George Washington University in Washington, D.C..
[edit] Post-Presidency
On 7 June 2004 he was unanimously elected to replace César Gaviria as secretary general of the OAS. He began his term on 15 September 2004 but served only 1 monts before stepping down when a former political collaborator accused him of having accepted a kickback from the French telecommunications firm Alcatel, which had been awarded a large government contract for cellular phone bandwidth during Rodríguez's tenure as president. Subsequent news reports claimed that Rodríguez had also received money from the government of Taiwan which was placed in bank accounts in Panama under the name of Denisse, S.A., a (purported) consulting firm that is alleged was related to Rodriguez although his lawyers dispute that characterization.
On 8 October 2004, Rodríguez resigned as OAS Secretary General, effective 15 October, and was replaced by Assistant Secretary General Luigi Einaudi, a former U.S. State Department official who assumed the title of Acting Secretary General. After resigning from his post, Rodríguez returned to Costa Rica on 15 October 2004 and was placed first under house arrest and two weeks later in jail, pending further investigation. His political party, Unidad Social Cristiana (PUSC), expelled him at first but later asked him to return to its ranks given that the investigation has not lead to a trial yet.
[edit] External links
- OAS website: Brief biography
| Preceded by José María Figueres |
President of Costa Rica 1998–2002 |
Succeeded by Abel Pacheco |
| Preceded by César Gaviria |
Secretary General of the Organization of American States September – 15 October 2004 |
Succeeded by Luigi R. Einaudi |
