Ecuador’s
April 11 election that led to a 5-point victory by conservative
banker Guillermo Lasso over progressive candidate Andrés Arauz
was not what it appeared to be. On the surface, it was a surprisingly
clean and professional election, as our CODEPINK official observer
delegation witnessed. But a fraud-free process for casting and
counting ballots does not mean that the election was free and fair.
Behind the scenes was a monumentally unequal playing field and dirty
campaign designed to quash an Arauz win.
For
starters, Arauz—a 36-year-old follower of the political
leanings of former president Rafael Correa and his Citizens
Revolution—barely even got on the ballot. The political party
he tried to run under was banned by the National Electoral Council
(CNE). He and his supporters formed a new political party and that,
too, was banned. Eventually, they found a small party that let them
borrow their slot, but by then it was late December and the first
round of elections was on February 7. The other campaigns had a four
or five-month head start.
Arauz,
who was virtually unknown, wanted to have Rafael Correa as his vice
president, but the CNE banned Correa from being on the ticket. Even
more astounding, the electoral authorities prohibited the Arauz
campaign from even using Correa's voice or image. But in a show of
blatant bias, they didn't banish Correa's image from being used in a
negative way by his opponents.
Another
intense obstacle was the role of the media. The corporate media
dominate all the airwaves in Ecuador, and they were clearly in the
Lasso camp. The media led a dirty campaign spreading fake news about
Arauz, Correa, and their supporters. They scared people by claiming
that Arauz was going to de-dollarize the economy. Ecuador has been
using the dollar as its currency since 2000 after a financial crisis
saw the collapse of its former currency, the sucre. An economist,
Arauz was well aware that dollarization had stabilized Ecuador's
economy and he never even suggested going back to the sucre.
A
particularly absurd accusation came from Colombia, where the
country’s right-wing attorney general claimed that the National
Liberation Army, an armed insurgent group that has been operating in
Colombia for decades, made an $80,000 loan to Arauz’s campaign.
Based on a doctored video that was proven to be false, this
accusation nevertheless continued to circulate throughout the press
to sully Arauz’s character.
A
concerted smear campaign also attacked the legacy of Rafael Correa to
scare people away from voting for Arauz. During his time in power
from 2007 to 2017, Correa brought economic and political stability to
a country that had had seven presidents in ten years. Correa, who has
a Ph.D. in economics, completely transformed Ecuador into a modern
democracy with a vibrant middle class. He also brought tremendous
gains to the poor, reducing
poverty
from 37 percent to 22 percent, and built critical infrastructure,
including highways, hospitals, and schools. But the portrayal in the
media made Correa out to be a corrupt authoritarian who was a threat
to democracy, creating a dilemma for the Arauz campaign about how
much to align itself with Correa's legacy.
The
media smear campaign went hand-in-hand with attacks on the left that
had been going on for the past four years under the presidency of
Lenin Moreno. Ironically, Moreno had been Rafael Correa's vice
president and ran on the ticket of Correa's Citizens Revolution. But
once in power, he orchestrated a kind of "silent coup,"
betraying Correa, the Citizens Revolution, and the progressive
policies they stood for. Making common cause with the elites,
including Guillermo Lasso, he imposed austerity policies and signed a
terrible deal with the IMF that focused on budget cuts, deregulation,
and reducing workers' rights. In October 2019, there was an uprising
against the elimination of a fuel subsidy that would have raised
prices on everything from transportation to food. It was put down
violently by Moreno's government and many of the protest leaders
remain in prison today.
Lasso
supported Moreno's austerity measures, the deal with the IMF, and the
violent crackdown on protesters, yet his campaign successfully
managed to create distance between him and Moreno. The narrative spun
in the media was that Arauz would continue in the footsteps of Moreno
and Correa as if Moreno had not betrayed the movement.
Moreno
viciously lashed out at the left through the misuse of the legal
system for political purposes, a tactic known as lawfare. Jorge Glas,
Moreno's vice president who spoke out against his betrayal of the
Citizens Movement, was accused of corruption, convicted, and put in
jail, where he remains under dire conditions. Moreno's government
attacked Correa himself, who went into exile in Belgium to avoid
being thrown into prison. About 30 charges are pending against
Correa, including a farcical accusation that he had psychic influence
over people that led them to become corrupt.
Other
top party leaders were hounded and are now either jailed, under house
arrest or forced into exile. The decapitation of the Citizens
Revolution meant that Arauz's campaign was significantly weaker than
it would have been with their help.
Given
all the strikes against Arauz, it is remarkable he did so well. Had
it not been for lawfare, a biased CNE, and a dirty campaign, he would
have won. However, another major factor was the rift between the
Citizens Revolution and the indigenous movement that happened under
Correa's tenure, which led to calls for a "null vote."
The
Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE) and its
political party Pachikutik were represented in the first round of
voting by Yaku Pérez, who did well but didn't make the final
cut. Feeling that neither of the two presidential candidates
represented the indigenous community, Pérez called for people
to spoil their ballot by "voting null" (voting is mandatory
in Ecuador so a spoiled ballot is equivalent to boycotting the
election).
There
was some dissent from the “vote null” position—just
days before the election, CONAIE President Jorge Vargas came out in
favor of Arauz—but a significant percentage of indigenous
peoples voted blank. Roughly 1.7 million Ecuadorians decided to
either vote blank or to spoil their ballot. That was a critical
factor in the election, given that Lasso won by only about 420,000
votes. Accused of enabling a right-wing victory, some members of
Pachakutik argued that they voted null because they believe they can
bring down the Lasso government through popular uprisings similar to
what occurred in October 2019.
A
victory by Arauz would have helped people struggling during this
pandemic—Moreno so mismanaged the health situation that Ecuador
has one of the world’s worst COVID death rates and the economy
has been devastated.
Arauz
would have also strengthened the left throughout Latin America,
promoting the kind of regional integration that took place during the
so-called Pink Tide in the early 2000s when a succession of
progressive governments took power in Latin America and the
Caribbean. New institutions were created such as UNASUR, the Union of
South American Nations, and CELAC, the Community of Latin American
and the Caribbean States. These became a counterbalance to the
Organization of American States, which is used as a tool of the U.S.
State Department to promote U.S. foreign policy throughout the
region. These new regional organizations were part of a much broader
vision of regional integration along the lines of the European Union.
If
those organizations were as strong now as they had been several years
ago, Latin America would likely have been in a better position to
deal with the pandemic because they could have bought vaccines
together and cooperated on public health policies.
In
the coming years, Ecuador’s Citizens Revolution will have to
use this time to regroup, repair frayed relations with indigenous and
union groups, and build a strong social base of support. This social
base is something they never really achieved, even under Correa’s
mandate. They do, however, still have a majority in the National
Assembly. The second biggest assembly bloc is the indigenous party
Pachakutik, which will undoubtedly be courted by Lasso’s
government but also has left tendencies. So there may be room to make
alliances and fight back against Lasso’s austerity policies.
On
the regional level, it's a shame that Ecuador won't be helping to
swell the ranks of the Pink Tide. But hopefully, other nations in
Latin America—such as Peru, Chile, Brazil, and even
Colombia—have a chance in the coming years to keep the second
wave of the Pink Tide afloat.
This commentary was originally published by CODEPINK
|