Miguel Ángel Rodríguez

个人简介

Miguel Ángel Rodríguez Echeverría (born 9 January 1940) is a Costa Rican economist, lawyer, businessman and politician who served as the 43rd President of Costa Rica from 1998 to 2002. A liberal member of the Social Christian Unity Party, he has remained active as a writer and columnist since leaving public office. Before the presidency, Rodríguez served as Minister of Planning from 1968 to 1970 and as Minister of the Presidency in 1970 during the administration of José Joaquín Trejos Fernández. He was also a member of the board of the Central Bank of Costa Rica from 1966 to 1969, and served as a deputy in the Legislative Assembly of Costa Rica from 1990 to 1994, including as president of the assembly from 1991 to 1992. In 2004, Rodríguez was elected Secretary General of the Organization of American States. He later voluntarily resigned from the post to return to Costa Rica and face allegations of financial misconduct related to his presidential administration, including accusations that he had received bribes from the French company Alcatel in connection with telecommunications contracts. On 27 April 2011, he was sentenced to five years in prison. However, the ruling was overturned in December 2012 by an appeals court, which acquitted him of all charges. Rodríguez was elected to the presidency with an agenda that included opening state-run monopolies in insurance and telecommunications, restructuring the public sector through a greater private-sector role in infrastructure, trade liberalization, and the expansion and modernization of the welfare system. Proposed reforms to the insurance and telecommunications sectors provoked the 2000 Costa Rican protests and were abandoned at the time, though similar measures were later implemented after Costa Rica joined the CAFTA-DR in 2009.