2014 Election Blog: Costa Rican Candidate Ends Campaign during Runoff Race
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The April 6 election will go ahead as planned, but the ruling party candidate will stop campaigning, he announced on March 5.
On March 5, the ruling National Liberation Party’s presidential candidate Johnny Araya announced he would discontinue his campaign ahead of the April 6 runoff election. Araya, the former mayor of San José, came in second during the first round of Costa Rica’s presidential race on February 2, winning 29.71 percent. The first place finisher, Luis Solís of the Citizens’ Action Party, earned 30.64 percent—shy of the 40 percent minimum to avoid a runoff. It is the first time in Costa Rican history that a candidate has dropped out of a presidential runoff.