In a joint statement, the National Union of Employees of the Fund and Social Security (Undeca) and the Costa Rican Union and Social Unitary Bloc (Bussco) revealed that an internal audit by the Costa Rican Social Security Fund (CCSS) revealed this Monday the aforementioned conflict of interest did not exist in a vote on a salary adjustment in the company.
Last November, President Rodrigo Chaves announced at a press conference the Governing Council’s decision to dismiss five members of the CCSS governing board for, among other things, voting on September 8, 2022 for a salary adjustment in this institution to benefit dependents.
Undeca and Bussco confirm that, following a verbal complaint from the Executive President, the government has suspended five directors of the most emblematic institution, in yet another maneuver against the Social Democratic State in violation of the Political Constitution and the founding law of the CCSS itself. with the apology of the salary adjustment applied in the fund.
They point out that the government fired the Executive President of the CCSS, Álvaro Ramos, last September for paying legitimate labor law and appointed the current Executive President, Marta Esquivel, with an obligation to include the body in the fiscal rule and eliminate the collective bargaining agreement .
But they point out that by failing to carry out this assignment, he is facilitating a “political trial” against CCSS director Martha Rodríguez (Sindical); José Luis Loría (Cooperatives); Maritza Jiménez (solidarity); Jorge Arturo Hernández (businessmen) and Carlos Salazar (government).
You recall that one of the arguments was precisely the conflict of interest for which Esquivel, in a letter dated November 9, 2022, asked Internal Audit to answer a series of questions aimed at accusing the directors of conflict of interest and overturning the salary adjustment .
In this regard, Internal Audit specified that “it is not possible for the collegiate body to stop issuing the administrative act if it affects the general public and it is the only competent body that can issue this act.”
Undeca and Bussco allege that the foregoing proves false interests by pretending not to pay the billion dollar debt (in colones) the government owes to the CCSS, degrading and privatizing the institution and lowering the wages of the Makes workers more precarious in favor of traders of health.
Both groups do not justify this arbitrary suspension and reiterate their support for the representative of the trade union sector on the board, Martha Elena Rodríguez, and for the directors, who have asserted institutional autonomy and justice for the workers, concerned with great mysticism about the health of the population .
rgh/ale