Ecuador’s elections: the worst of all possible worlds

Lenin Moreno, the government candidate, won the second round by a small margin, and the loser, the opposition candidate Guillermo Lasso, has vowed not to accept the result.

Democracia Abierta - Gerard Coffey 13/04/2017

Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa (C) and Ecuadorian ruling party candidate Lenin Moreno (R) attend the change of guard ceremony in Quito, Ecuador, on April 3, 2017. Photo: Open Democracy

During the first round of voting in the Ecuadorian Presidential elections, while commenting for one of the national TV channels, a friend claimed that a run-off would provide the eventual winner with more legitimacy. I did not agree. I told him so, and said I felt that a close race, especially in the eventuality of a win for the government candidate, might well provoke a campaign to destabilise the new administration similar to the one we have seen in Venezuela over the last few years. It might turn out to be, I suggested, the worst of all possible worlds.

Now, watching Guillermo Lasso, the losing candidate (until proved otherwise) in the April 2 election, ramping up the rhetoric and vowing not to accept the result because Lenin Moreno “did not win”, while his supporters block roads, burn tires and call for the armed forces to intervene, I feel as if I am watching a film whose plot I already know. I should say out of respect for my friend’s opinion that if Moreno had won by a narrow margin in that first round, or possibly by any margin, the noscript would almost certainly have been the same. There is nothing coincidental about what is happening on the streets of Ecuador.

I suppose the scene was set for conflict when, after receiving the results of an exit poll carried out by the company CEDATOS, Lasso declared himself the country’s next President. It was either a foolhardy or, more likely, a well calculated move that was bound to set the scene for protests if he didn’t win the final count, which after all is the only one that counts. In the worst case scenario, one that has been speculated on for some time, the final result would only have mattered to the banker candidate if he had won: in any other scenario, protests and claims of fraud were a foregone conclusion.

Up the poll?

One of the worrying elements of the CEDATOS poll was that the firm counts Lasso amongst its clients, which in itself is not of course a guarantee of partiality, although it certainly doesn’t help. Two more exit polls also gave the victory to Lasso (one of which, Market, is questionable; the other being Informe Confidential, one of whose owners is Jaime Durán Barba, strategist of Mauricio Macri in Argentina) while Perfiles de Opinión, a firm generally seen as favouring Alianza País candidates (the government is a client) gave the victory to Lenin Moreno. You believe the pollsters if it suits you, and at your own risk, as Alianza País itself has been made aware a number of times.