Ecuador presidential election: Daniel Noboa, heir to banana fortune, wins run-off vote

Daniel Noboa, an inexperienced politician and an heir to a fortune built on the banana trade, won Ecuador’s presidential run-off election held amid unprecedented violence that even claimed the life of a candidate.

With about 96 per cent of the votes counted on Sunday, electoral officials said Noboa had 52.2 per cent of the votes, compared to 47.8 per cent for Luisa González, a leftist lawyer and ally of exiled former President Rafael Correa.

Gonzalez conceded defeat during a speech before supporters Sunday night and said she planned to call Noboa to congratulate him.

Noboa, 35, will lead Ecuador during a period marked by unprecedented violence that even claimed the life of a presidential candidate.

Noboa, Ecuador’s youngest-ever president-elect, vowed that “tomorrow we begin work to rebuild a country that has been severely hit by violence, corruption and hatred”.

Throughout the campaign, Ecuadorians, who now have to continuously watch their backs and limit how often they leave home, had a universal demand – safety.

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The nationwide uneasiness began when violence erupted about three years ago, but it reached an unthinkable level when Fernando Villavicencio was killed August 9 as he left a campaign rally.

Noboa’s political career began in 2021, when he earned a seat in the National Assembly and chaired its Economic Development Commission. The US-educated businessman opened an event organising company when he was 18 and then joined his father’s Noboa Corp, where he held management positions in the shipping, logistics and commercial areas.

His father, Alvaro Noboa, is the richest man in Ecuador thanks to a conglomerate that started in the growing and shipping of bananas -Ecuador’s main crop – and now includes more than 128 companies in dozens of countries. The elder Noboa unsuccessfully ran for president five times.

The new president’s term will run only through May 2025, which is what remains of the tenure of President Guillermo Lasso. He cut his term short when he dissolved the country’s National Assembly in May as lawmakers carried out impeachment proceedings against him over alleged improprieties in a contract by a state-owned company.

Lasso, a conservative former banker, clashed constantly with lawmakers after his election in 2021 and decided not to run in the special election.

Under Lasso’s watch, violent deaths soared, reaching 4,600 in 2022, the country’s highest in history and double the total in 2021. The National Police tallied 3,568 violent deaths in the first half of 2023.

The spike in violence is tied to cocaine trafficking. Mexican, Colombian and Balkan cartels have set roots in Ecuador and operate with assistance from local criminal gangs.

Noboa and Gonzalez, both of whom have served short stints as lawmakers, advanced to the run-off by finishing ahead of six other candidates in the election’s first round on August 22. The replacement of Villavicencio finished in third place.

A large group of military and police officers as well as private security guards protected Noboa when he voted in Olon, a community on the country’s central Pacific coast. He wore a bulletproof vest.

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“I believe that the trend is irreversible, and today, we begin to build a new Ecuador,” he said at the voting centre, confidently alluding to a victory.

Gonzalez, a lawyer, was unknown to most voters until the party of Correa, her mentor, picked her as its presidential candidate. She held various government jobs during Correa’s decade-long presidency and was a lawmaker from 2021 until May.

At the start of the campaign, she said Correa would be her adviser, but she recently sought to distance herself a bit in an effort to court voters who oppose the former president, who remains a major force in Ecuador despite being found guilty of corruption in 2020 and sentenced in absentia to eight years in prison. He has been living in his wife’s native Belgium since 2017.

Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse