Background
Daniel Oduber Quirós was born on 25 August 1921 in San Jose.
government official politician president
Daniel Oduber Quirós was born on 25 August 1921 in San Jose.
He received a master’s degree in philosophy from McGill University and studied in France at the Sorbonne.
He was one of a group of students at the Liceo de Costa Rica and the Law School who formed the Center for the Study of National Problems in 1940.
Oduber helped found the Social Democratic Party in 1945 and participated in the 1948 civil war. Following the triumph of José Figueres Ferrer in that conflict, he served as secretary general of the Founding Junta of the Second Republic. He was a founder in 1951 of the National Liberation Party (PLN), of which he became secretary general in 1956. He headed the PLN caucus in Congress for the 1958-1962 term and was foreign minister under President Francisco José Orlich Bolmarcich.
Oduber was the PLN’s candidate for president in 1966 but lost. He took the defeat very hard and sued the conservative newspaper. La Nación, for libel. His disappointment was compounded when Figueres sought the PLN nomination in 1970. However, he succeeded Figueres as president in 1974, the first time the PLN had won two consecutive terms.
After leaving the presidency, Oduber was active in the Socialist International, as its vice president, and in lecturing in universities in Europe and the United States.