ECUADOR HAS REGRESSIVE ANTI ABORTION LAW
By AFP
February 10, 2025
(COMBO) Combinación de foto de Daniel Noboa y de Luisa González, creada el 13 de enero de 2025. - Copyright AFP/File
(COMBO) Combinación de foto de Daniel Noboa y de Luisa González, creada el 13 de enero de 2025. - Copyright AFP/File
Galo Paguay,
Rodrigo BUENDIA
Paola LOPEZ
Ecuador’s closer-than-expected presidential election is likely headed for an April runoff between two very different candidates who have faced each other three times already.
Incumbent president Daniel Noboa and leftist Luisa Gonzalez both hail from the country’s populous Pacific coastal belt, are sporty and telegenic, and have several tattoos.
But that’s where the similarities end.
Noboa, 37, is the mega-rich scion of a billion-dollar banana empire, while Gonzalez, a single mother and lawyer 10 years his elder, recalls running around shoeless while growing up in humble surroundings.
– Young blood –
Noboa’s brand of youthful cool mixed with security hawkishness has made him one of the most popular politicians in a country of 18 million people beset by narco violence.
It has also made him one of the youngest elected political leaders in the world.
One day he can be found on Instagram in a crisp white T-shirt and sneakers, strumming a song by the Goo Goo Dolls on an acoustic guitar and crooning along in English.
The next, he’s striding, shirt-unbuttoned, shoulder-to-shoulder with heavily armed soldiers, or donning a bulletproof vest to lead ready-for-TV security operations.
Despite the flash public image, people describe him as reserved.
He is said to keep a very small circle of friends and advisors around him, some of whom he has known since his school days.
That circle includes his wife, nutrition influencer Lavinia Valbonesi, with whom he had two of his three children.
His speeches can be vanishingly brief — sometimes just two or three minutes long — and this on a continent with a long history of leaders delivering hours-long stem-winders.
In office since November 2023, he has enjoyed a short but intense first stint as president, a time marked by his war on gangs and a drought-related energy crisis.
He was elected to complete the four-year term of predecessor Guillermo Lasso, who had called a snap vote to avoid impeachment for alleged embezzlement.
Noboa now wants to continue this work and has repeatedly insisted that “nothing can be resolved in a year”.
A wine connoisseur and budding musician, he was born in the United States. His father Alvaro ran for the presidency — unsuccessfully — five times.
At the age of 18, Noboa created his own events company before joining the family business.
He holds a degree in business administration from New York University and three master’s degrees from Harvard, Northwestern, and George Washington universities.
Noboa describes his politics as center-left and is said to have once held up Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva as a political role model.
But he won the election with support from the right and has embraced neo-liberal economic policies and hard-right politicians ever since.
He was one of the few Latin American leaders to travel to Washington for US President Donald Trump’s second inauguration.
Before being elected president himself, Noboa’s only previous political experience was two years as a lawmaker, when he served as chairman of the congressional economics committee.
– Humble origins –
An avid cyclist and marathon runner, 47-year-old Gonzalez garnered the most votes in the first round of voting in 2023 — only to lose to Noboa in the second round.
She is the protege of socialist ex-president Rafael Correa, living in exile and sentenced in absentia by an Ecuadoran court to eight years in prison for corruption related to public contracts.
Trained as a lawyer, Gonzalez started politics on the right of the political spectrum, later switching sides and serving in the government of Correa, who continues to loom large as a divisive figure in Ecuadoran politics.
Gonzalez has vowed to pursue his socialist policies, while insisting he will be nothing more than an advisor.
From humble origins in a small town in Ecuador’s southwest, Gonzalez holds master’s degrees in economics and management.
Married at 15 and divorced at 22, she is a single mother of two sons — she had the first when she was just 16.
She describes herself as coming from loving but humble beginnings and is proud of being the first generation of her family to become a professional.
Millions of Ecuadorans, she told AFP recently, “believe that they cannot achieve their dreams because they do not have sufficient resources.”
“Look at my case, yes you can” she said.
Gonzalez would be Ecuador’s first elected woman president.
She has sought to portray herself as a defender of women’s rights.
But she has come under fire for her opposition as a lawmaker to abortion, even in cases of rape.
A 50-year crisis — Ecuador’s next president faces a stern test
By AFP
February 7, 2025
A soldier stands guard outside the National Electoral Council (CNE) in Quito on February 7, 2025 - Copyright AFP Rodrigo BUENDIA
Andrew BEATTY
In the throes of a bloody drug war, a shrinking economy and an acute energy crisis, Ecuadorans are remarkably optimistic about their country’s future as they prepare to vote in Sunday election.
The past few years have been brutal for Ecuador, a scenic Andean nation of about 18 million people once a bastion of stability in a troubled region.
But drought-fueled power cuts have plunged swaths of the country into darkness, and drug-fueled violence has seen a presidential candidate assassinated, prisons overrun by gangs and gunmen storming a television station while journalists were live on air.
Yet a December survey by Comunicaliza, a local polling firm, showed more than 50 percent of voters think their country will be better off this time next year.
“Why?” less cheery observers in Quito ask wryly.
Whether hawkish President Daniel Noboa or leftist rival Luisa Gonzalez wins Sunday’s election — or an April runoff — they will be bombarded by challenges, any one of which alone would be daunting.
“Ecuador is in a very difficult moment, I think in the worst crisis since we returned to democracy,” said Leonardo Laso, a local political analyst, referring to a period of deep crisis almost half a century ago.
The most acute challenge may be security.
With a dollarized economy, blessed with excellent Pacific ports and wedged between the world’s two largest cocaine producers — Colombia and Peru — Ecuador has become a paradise for narco-traffickers.
“You have the Albanians and the Balkan mafias, you have the Ndrangheta from Italy, you have the Turkish mafias all operating in Ecuador,” said Douglas Farah, a security consultant and Latin America analyst.
“And you have now local gangs like Los Lobos, the Choneros, who are fighting for territory, to be able to move product through Ecuador to their new buyers in Europe and in Asia.”
The result has been record levels of murder, extortion and kidnapping that have caught the authorities flatfooted.
“They never had this type of violence,” said Farah. “They are getting slammed by a whole new phenomenon for which they are totally unprepared.”
Noboa’s response has been to deploy the military, arrest gang leaders and intercept cocaine shipments wherever possible.
It has given Ecuadorans a sense that something is being done, but few experts believe it is a long-term strategy for success.
The alternatives — relying on intelligence, effective policing, prison reform and developing jobs and social services — all cost time and money. Ecuador has little of either.
– Economic woes –
Driving around the capital Quito it is easy to spot roads and once gleaming infrastructure investments that were the envy of the region, but are now starting to look a little unkempt.
“It’s very likely that the economy contracted last year,” said economist Albert Acosta Burneo, pointing in part to rolling blackouts in late 2024 that shuttered businesses for a chunk of December.
The crisis was caused by a drought that hit hydropower generation, but experts also blame a lack of investment in electricity generation.
After more than a decade of spending without the proceeds of a commodities boom that once padded treasury coffers, government debt now stands at about 57 percent of GDP.
Noboa was recently forced to turn to the IMF to build up a financial war chest.
But more cost cutting is likely as the country still struggles to borrow on bond markets cheaply — thanks to low reserves and more than a dozen recent defaults.
The security situation has made the country’s economic woes all the worse, scaring away visitors and investors alike.
“There are no tourists, there are no customers,” said 58-year-old Maria Delfina Toaquiza Ughsa, an Indigenous artist who has a stall on a hill overlooking Quito’s old town.
Political analyst Laso said Noboa’s penchant for using the military to tackle the drug problem has also hurt the country’s image.
“He goes out with a bulletproof vest and helmet, he declares a state of emergency, he closes land borders during the election for a potential threat that may occur, he says that we are at war, this negates any possibility of investment,” he told AFP.
If that were not enough, the new president will also have to find a way to navigate US President Donald Trump’s love of deportations and tariffs.
Noboa has agreed to help with US deportations, even though Ecuadorans send about $6 billion back home every year, and any drop in remittances or emigration would be keenly felt.
“Migration was like a pressure valve for the economy, that is now blocked thanks to the policies of Trump,” said Acosta Burneo.
Paola LOPEZ
Ecuador’s closer-than-expected presidential election is likely headed for an April runoff between two very different candidates who have faced each other three times already.
Incumbent president Daniel Noboa and leftist Luisa Gonzalez both hail from the country’s populous Pacific coastal belt, are sporty and telegenic, and have several tattoos.
But that’s where the similarities end.
Noboa, 37, is the mega-rich scion of a billion-dollar banana empire, while Gonzalez, a single mother and lawyer 10 years his elder, recalls running around shoeless while growing up in humble surroundings.
– Young blood –
Noboa’s brand of youthful cool mixed with security hawkishness has made him one of the most popular politicians in a country of 18 million people beset by narco violence.
It has also made him one of the youngest elected political leaders in the world.
One day he can be found on Instagram in a crisp white T-shirt and sneakers, strumming a song by the Goo Goo Dolls on an acoustic guitar and crooning along in English.
The next, he’s striding, shirt-unbuttoned, shoulder-to-shoulder with heavily armed soldiers, or donning a bulletproof vest to lead ready-for-TV security operations.
Despite the flash public image, people describe him as reserved.
He is said to keep a very small circle of friends and advisors around him, some of whom he has known since his school days.
That circle includes his wife, nutrition influencer Lavinia Valbonesi, with whom he had two of his three children.
His speeches can be vanishingly brief — sometimes just two or three minutes long — and this on a continent with a long history of leaders delivering hours-long stem-winders.
In office since November 2023, he has enjoyed a short but intense first stint as president, a time marked by his war on gangs and a drought-related energy crisis.
He was elected to complete the four-year term of predecessor Guillermo Lasso, who had called a snap vote to avoid impeachment for alleged embezzlement.
Noboa now wants to continue this work and has repeatedly insisted that “nothing can be resolved in a year”.
A wine connoisseur and budding musician, he was born in the United States. His father Alvaro ran for the presidency — unsuccessfully — five times.
At the age of 18, Noboa created his own events company before joining the family business.
He holds a degree in business administration from New York University and three master’s degrees from Harvard, Northwestern, and George Washington universities.
Noboa describes his politics as center-left and is said to have once held up Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva as a political role model.
But he won the election with support from the right and has embraced neo-liberal economic policies and hard-right politicians ever since.
He was one of the few Latin American leaders to travel to Washington for US President Donald Trump’s second inauguration.
Before being elected president himself, Noboa’s only previous political experience was two years as a lawmaker, when he served as chairman of the congressional economics committee.
– Humble origins –
An avid cyclist and marathon runner, 47-year-old Gonzalez garnered the most votes in the first round of voting in 2023 — only to lose to Noboa in the second round.
She is the protege of socialist ex-president Rafael Correa, living in exile and sentenced in absentia by an Ecuadoran court to eight years in prison for corruption related to public contracts.
Trained as a lawyer, Gonzalez started politics on the right of the political spectrum, later switching sides and serving in the government of Correa, who continues to loom large as a divisive figure in Ecuadoran politics.
Gonzalez has vowed to pursue his socialist policies, while insisting he will be nothing more than an advisor.
From humble origins in a small town in Ecuador’s southwest, Gonzalez holds master’s degrees in economics and management.
Married at 15 and divorced at 22, she is a single mother of two sons — she had the first when she was just 16.
She describes herself as coming from loving but humble beginnings and is proud of being the first generation of her family to become a professional.
Millions of Ecuadorans, she told AFP recently, “believe that they cannot achieve their dreams because they do not have sufficient resources.”
“Look at my case, yes you can” she said.
Gonzalez would be Ecuador’s first elected woman president.
She has sought to portray herself as a defender of women’s rights.
But she has come under fire for her opposition as a lawmaker to abortion, even in cases of rape.
A 50-year crisis — Ecuador’s next president faces a stern test
By AFP
February 7, 2025
A soldier stands guard outside the National Electoral Council (CNE) in Quito on February 7, 2025 - Copyright AFP Rodrigo BUENDIA
Andrew BEATTY
In the throes of a bloody drug war, a shrinking economy and an acute energy crisis, Ecuadorans are remarkably optimistic about their country’s future as they prepare to vote in Sunday election.
The past few years have been brutal for Ecuador, a scenic Andean nation of about 18 million people once a bastion of stability in a troubled region.
But drought-fueled power cuts have plunged swaths of the country into darkness, and drug-fueled violence has seen a presidential candidate assassinated, prisons overrun by gangs and gunmen storming a television station while journalists were live on air.
Yet a December survey by Comunicaliza, a local polling firm, showed more than 50 percent of voters think their country will be better off this time next year.
“Why?” less cheery observers in Quito ask wryly.
Whether hawkish President Daniel Noboa or leftist rival Luisa Gonzalez wins Sunday’s election — or an April runoff — they will be bombarded by challenges, any one of which alone would be daunting.
“Ecuador is in a very difficult moment, I think in the worst crisis since we returned to democracy,” said Leonardo Laso, a local political analyst, referring to a period of deep crisis almost half a century ago.
The most acute challenge may be security.
With a dollarized economy, blessed with excellent Pacific ports and wedged between the world’s two largest cocaine producers — Colombia and Peru — Ecuador has become a paradise for narco-traffickers.
“You have the Albanians and the Balkan mafias, you have the Ndrangheta from Italy, you have the Turkish mafias all operating in Ecuador,” said Douglas Farah, a security consultant and Latin America analyst.
“And you have now local gangs like Los Lobos, the Choneros, who are fighting for territory, to be able to move product through Ecuador to their new buyers in Europe and in Asia.”
The result has been record levels of murder, extortion and kidnapping that have caught the authorities flatfooted.
“They never had this type of violence,” said Farah. “They are getting slammed by a whole new phenomenon for which they are totally unprepared.”
Noboa’s response has been to deploy the military, arrest gang leaders and intercept cocaine shipments wherever possible.
It has given Ecuadorans a sense that something is being done, but few experts believe it is a long-term strategy for success.
The alternatives — relying on intelligence, effective policing, prison reform and developing jobs and social services — all cost time and money. Ecuador has little of either.
– Economic woes –
Driving around the capital Quito it is easy to spot roads and once gleaming infrastructure investments that were the envy of the region, but are now starting to look a little unkempt.
“It’s very likely that the economy contracted last year,” said economist Albert Acosta Burneo, pointing in part to rolling blackouts in late 2024 that shuttered businesses for a chunk of December.
The crisis was caused by a drought that hit hydropower generation, but experts also blame a lack of investment in electricity generation.
After more than a decade of spending without the proceeds of a commodities boom that once padded treasury coffers, government debt now stands at about 57 percent of GDP.
Noboa was recently forced to turn to the IMF to build up a financial war chest.
But more cost cutting is likely as the country still struggles to borrow on bond markets cheaply — thanks to low reserves and more than a dozen recent defaults.
The security situation has made the country’s economic woes all the worse, scaring away visitors and investors alike.
“There are no tourists, there are no customers,” said 58-year-old Maria Delfina Toaquiza Ughsa, an Indigenous artist who has a stall on a hill overlooking Quito’s old town.
Political analyst Laso said Noboa’s penchant for using the military to tackle the drug problem has also hurt the country’s image.
“He goes out with a bulletproof vest and helmet, he declares a state of emergency, he closes land borders during the election for a potential threat that may occur, he says that we are at war, this negates any possibility of investment,” he told AFP.
If that were not enough, the new president will also have to find a way to navigate US President Donald Trump’s love of deportations and tariffs.
Noboa has agreed to help with US deportations, even though Ecuadorans send about $6 billion back home every year, and any drop in remittances or emigration would be keenly felt.
“Migration was like a pressure valve for the economy, that is now blocked thanks to the policies of Trump,” said Acosta Burneo.
No comments:
Post a Comment