Leftist outsider in Ecuador election run-off
A pro-US banana tycoon and a leftist economist whose rhetoric echoes Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez are set for a run-off after neither scored an outright victory in yesterday’s presidential election, preliminary results showed.
With slightly more than 70% of ballots counted, Alvaro Noboa, Ecuador’s wealthiest man, led with 26.7% of the vote, compared to 22.5% for Rafael Correa, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal said in Quito.
A November 26 runoff had been expected as none of the 13 candidates in the field appeared likely to win outright.
The winner needed 50%, or at least 40% of the valid vote and a 10-point lead over the rest of the field to avoid an almost certain run-off.
Noboa would have to take approximately 80% of all remaining uncounted ballots to pull off a first-round victory.
Correa – whose front-running campaign caused investors to dump Ecuadorean bonds amid fears the former economy minister would move the South American nation into a leftist alliance with Venezuela, Cuba and Bolivia – challenged Noboa’s surprising ballot surge.
A tall and charismatic firebrand, Correa urged his followers to keep a close watch on the official vote count, warning that if he doesn’t win, “it means fraud and grave irregularities”.
“We have to win by such a wide margin in the second round … that they can’t deny the citizens’ victory,” Correa, 43, said at a news conference, insisting that his vote total was at least 10 percentage points higher that what he had received.
Noboa, 55, countered that Correa was acting like a “spoiled brat” because voters had given him “a whipping". The businessman, making his third run for the presidency, had moved up quickly in the polls in recent days.
