By IPS Correspondents
SAN JOSE, Oct 9 2004 (IPS)

The resignation of Organisation of American States (OAS) secretary-general Miguel Angel Rodríguez and an international warrant issued for his arrest on corruption charges will bring only passing damages, but lasting shame, to the regional body and Costa Rica, say analysts.

Rodríguez, 64, a former Costa Rican president and the first Central American to hold the top post in the OAS in over 50 years, is also the first OAS secretary-general forced to stepped down, as he faces accusations of corruption in his country.

José Antonio Lobo, a former cabinet minister and adviser to Rodríguez, accused him on Sep. 30 of accepting part of a bribe during his 1998-2002 presidential term, in a telecommunications deal involving the French firm Alcatel.

Costa Rican President Abel Pacheco called for him to resign as OAS chief, which he did on Friday, just 23 days after he was sworn in. The resignation takes effect on Oct. 15.

The Costa Rican attorney-general’s office immediately issued an order for his arrest, which also goes into effect on Oct. 15, as soon as Rodríguez loses his diplomatic immunity.

Besides causing a commotion in the 34 OAS member states – which include every country in the hemisphere with the exception of Cuba – and especially among those that sponsored his candidacy, the scandal will bring “only short-term instability in the inter-American system,” said foreign policy analyst Luis Guillermo Solís, a professor at the University of Costa Rica.

President Pacheco stated that he was “totally satisfied” with Rodríguez’s resignation, which he said was necessary to “avoid causing the country more shame.”

But, he told reporters, “he should have done it sooner, because he is accused of serious crimes and must come and answer for them.”

The Pacheco administration withdrew its support from Rodríguez on Oct. 2, just two days after the Alcatel-Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad (ICE) scandal broke out.

In 2001, Alcatel won a 148 million dollar contract from ICE, Costa Rica’s state-owned power and telecoms company, to install 400,000 cell-phone lines in the country.

According to Lobo, a former ICE director, who is implicated in the scandal, Alcatel paid those who helped it win the contract a kickback of 9.6 million dollars, 2.4 million of which went into accounts in the name of Lobo’s wife.

Sixty percent of that was to go to Rodríguez, Lobo confessed to the attorney-general’s office.

Lobo, who is in prison, also provided details of transfers of money from his wife’s accounts to Rodríguez’s wife’s bank accounts.

Rodríguez denies the accusations of corruption, and alleges that he merely asked Lobo, an old friend, for a loan of 140,000 dollars to help finance his campaign for the post of OAS secretary-general.

After stating that he would not step down, he travelled to Haiti to inspect the damages caused by a recent hurricane.

But the pressure for him to step down continued to mount. One of the countries that pressed hardest was Argentina, whose support played a key role in Rodríguez’s election as head of the OAS on Jun. 15.

In Costa Rica, the local branch of Transparency International, the National Association of Public Employees (ANEP) and Congress also urged Rodríguez to resign.

Argentina’s ambassador to the OAS, Rodolfo Gil, said “Miguel Angel’s excuses are not solid.”

In his letter of resignation, Rodríguez said he wished to “avoid costs” to his family and the OAS, and said he would voluntarily travel to Costa Rica to face the legal charges against him.

Mario Carazo, president of the local branch of Transparency International, said Rodríguez should have stepped down immediately, to save the OAS and Costa Rica from more shame.

In the face of this and other scandals, universities in Costa Rica have called a nationwide demonstration next Tuesday to protest public corruption.

But although Solís said Rodríguez “postponed his decision too long,” he added that the damages to the image of the OAS and Costa Rica would be merely fleeting.

“The OAS has mechanisms for dealing with turmoil,” said Solís. “The first measure is for assistant secretary-general Luigi Einaudi (from the U.S.) to replace Rodríguez.”

The international arrest warrant for Rodríguez was delivered to the U.S. Embassy in the Costa Rican capital, because OAS headquarters are based in Washington, D.C., said Attorney-General Francisco Dall’nese.

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