Ecuadorians have the feeling that nothing that has happened in their country has been normal for months, including these presidential elections that will take place in Ecuador on Sunday 15th. Never before has a president decreed the so-called death on the cross, a constitutional figure calling early elections and dissolving the assembly, as Guillermo Lasso did in May to avoid a political trial against him. Even for a society of 18 million people accustomed to watching the devastating consequences of drug trafficking in the region from the sidelines, fear had not become a life companion.
He will name his next president on Sunday, and the country is electing candidates who, although unknown to the majority of voters, have godfathers in the interior of the country who need no description. Luisa González is the one chosen by the movement of former President Rafael Correa to try to bring Correism back to power and Daniel Noboa is the son of the millionaire businessman Álvaro Noboa, a perennial candidate who is up to five Tried unsuccessfully to become president. The two mentors faced each other 17 years ago in the 2006 election, which Correism won. Today the polls are in Noboa’s favor, but the high number of undecided people makes it impossible to predict the outcome.
The winner of the election has barely 16 months left before going to the polls again, as the law will limit him to finishing Lasso’s unfinished term. Little time for a country that, in addition to violence, is faced with a serious political crisis, a delicate economic situation and a growing exodus of Ecuadorians in search of a better place. This is an analysis of an Ecuador in crisis.
uncertainty
Ecuadorians have stopped recognizing their country. For decades, Ecuador was an oasis of peace in a turbulent region subject to the violence of the drug trade. Nestled between Colombia and Peru – the world’s two largest coca producers – the country had managed to prevent criminal groups from entering. However, in recent years, Ecuador’s strategic location – with a wide coastline on the Pacific – and the dollarization of the economy have made the country a coveted territory for the Mexican and Colombian mafia. From the country’s overcrowded prisons, the gangs gained power and organization to increase the violence that now subjects Ecuadorians to unprecedented numbers.
So far this year, 5,320 violent crimes have been recorded, the year 2022 had already closed with the highest number in history (4,600), twice as many as in 2021. At the current rate, by the end of this year it could reach a crime rate of 40 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants, which would make Ecuador one of the most violent countries in the world. One of these 5,320 crimes cost the life of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio after a rally in Quito a few days before the first round of elections. A murder that shocked Ecuadorians and showed that no one is safe from violent drift.
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politics
Guillermo Lasso’s battle with Congress was the tone that marked the mandate until it reached its final point in the impeachment trial of the president for alleged corruption, in which he could have been removed. The next president will also not have an easy time in an assembly in which none of the four forces represented has a majority and in which daily life is spent in a senseless confrontation instead of implementing the projects that the country needs against the government and the benches itself. As in other countries in the region, the discrediting of the institutions is enormous. According to a May poll by Click Research, 95% of Ecuadorians have a negative image of the assembly and 87% have a negative image of the judiciary. Lasso will also go home with absolute popularity.
In a country very used to protests, it surprised everyone that the day after the president ordered the death crusade and sent parliamentarians home, no one took to the streets to rebel against the coup at the president’s table. It seemed like no one cared too much, neither about those who were leaving nor about those who were to come. This separation between society and politics is also noticeable days before the crucial elections for the country. Although both Noboa and González embody two opposing visions, almost 40% of voters recognize that they have not yet decided who to vote for. Voting is compulsory in Ecuador, so anyone who doesn’t yet know which ballot to vote for is the country’s future president.
Business
Ecuador’s economy is also going through critical moments. The next ruler will face a budget deficit that will reach $5 billion at the end of this year, equivalent to almost 4% of GDP. “This will result in the outgoing government leaving its successor with large arrears and the new government using the central bank as a lender,” said José Hidalgo, director of Cordes. Although prohibited by law, it is a possibility that the two presidential candidates have raised as an option for financing the budget hole.
The central bank forecasts that Ecuador’s economy will grow by just 0.8% in 2024. “All these imbalances discourage foreign direct investment, which in the first half of this year represented 0.1% of GDP, a very low figure even by the already low standards that Ecuador has managed,” adds Hidalgo. Due to political uncertainty, the prospects for domestic private investments are also poor.
The fiscal options of the next government are limited. The current government has a $6.5 billion deal with the International Monetary Fund for 2020-2022. Since then there have been no new approaches with the IMF and for a government that will last only 16 months it will be difficult to get new credits. The measures proposed by several experts include affecting fuel subsidies, in which the country invests $3.5 billion, almost as much as in health and education, as well as increasing VAT. Either of these options is too unpopular for a new government that has so little time.
hopelessness
“It is hopeless not to look to the future in your own country,” says Luis Clavijo, a marketing engineer who started the migration process. “I once dreamed of starting my own business, but that is currently impossible in Ecuador. I live it every day when I see my customers being blackmailed.” He hopes to be in Canada by 2024, where he would like to start again. Beyond fear, uncertainty also impacts the economy. Businesses are forced to close one to two hours earlier than planned before night falls. Vaccines have become the new tax on citizens that criminals demand not only from companies in return for not attacking them, but also from professionals, street vendors, schools or teachers. Even in certain neighborhoods of Guayaquil, citizens have to pay just to live there.
One in four Ecuadorians lives in poverty (around 4.5 million), of which almost two million live in extreme poverty, 10.7% of the population. Shirley Silva, a domestic worker, has also considered leaving the country but will not do so without her four children. “It could be Chile, I heard that the economy is better.” He would also like to go to the USA, the main destination of the Ecuadorians, but he finds the trip with his children very dangerous. The salary is no longer enough to buy the essentials. On many days they eat two meals instead of three.
migration
More and more people are considering leaving the country. After Venezuelans, Ecuadorians are the migrants most likely to travel through the Darién jungle, one of the most dangerous places through which irregular migrants enter the United States. The Migration Office of Panama confirmed that 34,357 Ecuadorians crossed Darién as of July 31, more than in all of 2022, when 29,356 did so. The number started increasing after the crisis caused by the Covid pandemic, but now we have to add uncertainty issues.
Threats to traders, shootings in broad daylight or the recruitment of young people by criminal gangs are other reasons that are causing more and more Ecuadorians to seek better fortune. In 2022, the last year with official figures, 114,000 people migrated, but no updated data is available. It is an issue that has not received much attention so far, but for some experts it will be the next crisis that Ecuador will face. An exodus that will diminish the small Latin American country that needs a new president to save it from ruin.
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