There will be a second round in Ecuador’s presidential election. With 98 percent of the votes counted, it is clear that no candidate can reach enough votes.
Instead of a victory speech at one of the political headquarters in the capital Quito, Ecuadorians heard the president of the electoral commission Diana Atamaint say:
– We will move towards a second round of elections on October 15.
The left-leaning lawyer Luisa González received 33 percent of the vote and is the strongest going into the second round.
However, she does not have the most wind at her back. In October, she will face the big surprise of the election, the right-wing candidate Daniel Noboa. He received 24 percent of the vote, a result well ahead of several of the early favorites.
35-year-old Noboa is believed to have won many votes on a strong showing in the only televised debate, where he was wearing a bulletproof vest.
The election was held in the shadow of the assassination of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio in Quito on 9 August. He ran an unprecedented campaign against corruption and organized crime, and in the election almost all the candidates have promised to fight the drug cartels.
This applies not least to Noboa, who is trying to do what his father failed to do in five elections – to become the country’s president.