President Carlos Alvarado remains committed to defending and maintaining Banco de Costa Rica (BCR) director Julio Espinoza in his position, despite the fact that in Congress his name continues to be mentioned as one of those responsible for the fiscal gap that left the government of Luis Guillermo Solís (2014-2018).
This Thursday, the president defended Espinoza, despite the fact that on Wednesday Ana Beatriz Hernández, head of the Department of Statistics and Debt Management of the Ministry of Finance, said that he was responsible for an unusual reduction in the stock of debt swaps for the order of ₡ 300 billion in 2017, which would have been one of the triggers that opened the so-called fiscal gap.
Hernandez said the order came from Espinoza , when he was director of Public Credit.
President Alvarado insisted that at the time his government appointed Espinoza to the BCR, his administration still had no knowledge of the fiscal gap that Solís and his cabinet concealed from the country after leaving the Presidency. The appointment of Espinoza began to run on June 1st.
He concluded by saying that until the Comptroller General of the Republic does not issue an opinion, they will not take any action against Espinoza.