In Guayaquil, Luisa calls on people to defeat Rambo “the Lasso copycat” at the polls

“They want to fill us with terror and fear, fill us with sadness and pain. But we reacted with mobilization and firmness. We reacted strongly, saying no. Ecuador rises with faith, hope and dignity, because the Citizens’ Revolution is coming to bring development and decent jobs”, said Luisa González, opposition candidate who leads all polls for voting intentions for the presidential elections next Sunday (20).

With 2.7 million inhabitants, Guayaquil, the country’s largest city, is the capital of the province of Guayas, 4.5 million inhabitants, and was chosen for the closing of the Citizen Revolution (RC) campaign. In February – after 30 years of reactionary administrations -, the city elected Aquiles Álvares to mayoralty. Marcela Aguiñaga, president of the RC, was elected to the state government (2023-2027).

Ironically, Luisa condemned candidate Jan Topic, “for going around talking about security, like a very brave Rambo, behind a cell phone”. “But he has never been with the people, with the people, because he doesn’t dare. What bravery is this?”, she questioned her. In fact, clarified the opposition, is that the subject “owns security companies, which sells weapons and does not pay taxes.” “An imitation of Guillermo Lasso, the capricious man who wanted to arrive at Carondelet’s presidential palace to do what he did”, she repudiated.

Returning to quote Topic’s running sheet, which proposes to use the resources from traffic fines to finance the restructuring of the Police, Luisa recalled that he is the company that owns and manages the radars in the country. “Now he wants to go to the presidency to continue doing business with the state and taking money from the Ecuadorian people. They accuse us of being corrupt, but it has always been them,” she added.

Read too: “We are going to lift up the Homeland that they put on its knees”, says Luisa González in Quito

The opposition leader said that “we are a movement of principles and values, which looks people in the eye and does what it promises, unlike other parties that are acronyms for rent”. “Parties where a person shows up with a checkbook and says: well, I lack this whim and I want to be a candidate. And it becomes part of the acronym to which it never belonged, in which it never militated, which nobody knows”, she stressed.

As the candidate pointed out, this is the face of these gentlemen who are there. “When did you see them walking with you, with our farming brothers, artisanal fishermen or traders? Yes, against traders, to repress when they wanted to feed their families and couldn’t. But we, from the Citizen Revolution, made a Law for Autonomous Traders, to protect them and prevent them from continuing to be mistreated”.

Defending a present action by the State, Luisa attacked those who let the Ecuadorian people die without a doctor, in the middle of the pandemic. “We haven’t seen that since World War II. Mass graves in dear Guayaquil. Today there are people who cry because they still haven’t been able to find or even know where the bodies of their children, their parents, their siblings, their loved ones are. We already feel pain for the loss, at least we want to pray at the tomb. They are governments that only meant death. And all the other candidates were silent when they preferred debt payments, ”she protested.

What is at stake in these elections is the future of Ecuador, Luisa reiterated, the continuity of a development process “with the strengthening of public policy, which is carried out from below”, or the dismantling of essential services, with the “silence of those who they want to take over the State to do their business and leave us with nothing”.

“IN THESE TWO YEARS, THE BANKERS HAVE PROFITED”

Candidate for vice president, economist Andrés Arauz made it clear that Lasso’s plan was to “destroy our country, because the only ones who profited in those two years were the bankers, while the rest of our homeland is bankrupt. We have our brothers dying by the thousands and hundreds of thousands of patriots migrating.”

More than anything, defended Arauz, “we have to remember when talking to these last vacillators, with those who are still confused and changing their orientation every time they watch a little video”. “Talk to them so that they vote with conscience, that they use their memory. Because to vote for Luisa we don’t have to offer fantasy, but the work we will do, and right away”, said Rafael Correa’s former minister.

Read too: Debate shows strength of left-wing candidate in Ecuador election

Andrés stressed that it is the commitment to improving the living conditions of the population “which motivates us to be here and take on these enormous challenges and lead our beautiful homeland”. “And I always remember that love will overcome hate and we are here for love”, he stressed.

“GUAYAQUIL, GUAYAS AND ALL ECUADOR WANTS CHANGE”

Mayor Aquiles Álvarez thanked the demonstrators for their fraternal welcome and asserted that “Guayaquil, Guayas and all of Ecuador wants the Citizens’ Revolution, wants change, that’s what we’ve assumed and we’ve been doing non-stop. As Luisa said, we know how to do it, and we are already doing it”.

“Luisa is not alone, we are making a difference in the most important city halls and now we are going to do it for the country. And we will do it with all the affection in the world, unlike those who attack us with their hate speech on social media. They don’t realize that the networks are 3% and that the people are with us, in the streets and at the polls. We are just a few days away from making history and winning in the first round”, concluded the mayor, greeted by the demonstrators with the slogan: “a single lap”.

Governor Marcela Aguiñaga, former Minister of the Environment (2007-2012) under Rafael Correa and president of the Citizen Revolution Movement, listed the setbacks brought about by neoliberal governments. “We lost everything comrades, we lost health, education, security and in all areas. And our candidate is absolutely prepared, no improvisation. Luisa knows what to do, she is a person of integrity, loyal, who knows where she came from and what she owes her people, recognizing the principles that should guide our work. In these hard times, we have to regain hope, dream again and think that Ecuador can be different ”, she stressed.

Marcela proposes that Ecuador cease to be “the country of blood and desolation, of abandonment and misery, which we do not deserve”. For this reason, she called on those present to, “next Sunday, everyone get up early, call their family, talk to their neighbor and vote with conscience and deep affection for their land”. “A woman will give us back the Ecuador of dignity, sovereignty, employment, where there is no desire to migrate, so that the pain and desolation ends”.

Enthusiastically acclaimed by the audience present, former president Rafael Correa, politically persecuted and exiled in Belgium, via the internet, pointed out that victory is close, but that a lot depends on each one these days. “We will work until the last moment, as if we didn’t have a single vote. Your job as militants, as supporters, is to convince an undecided or deceived person to vote with certainty”, declared Correa, recalling: “We have done this before!”.

MEDIA MANIPULATE OR SILENCE ABOUT LUISA GONZÁLEZ

Under a sepulchral silence regarding the candidacy of the Citizen Revolution, the media reported that Christian Zurita, replacement for Fernando Villavicencio, the recently assassinated candidate, “offered to fulfill the plans and objectives ‘without revenge, but with determination'”, while highlighting also the show at the end of the campaign by Otto Sonnenholzner, defender of neocolonialism and representative of the Ecuadorian Broadcasting Association.

On the same Wednesday, in the city of Duram, in the state of Guayas, there was an exchange of fire near the campaign caravan of Daniel Noboa, son of the mega-businessman of the banana sector Álvaro Noboa – who was a five-time presidential candidate. Daniel wore a bulletproof vest, as he did in all his activities, including the presidential debate shown on Ecuador TV in which he behaved like a fox in Topic’s service.

In an official note, the National Police and the Ministry of the Interior ruled out that the shooting was linked to Daniel Noboa’s campaign activity. There are no reports of injuries.

As of Friday (18) the electoral campaign by the candidates is prohibited. Now, only the mainstream media speaks.

*Agência ComunicaSul is covering the presidential elections and the National Assembly of Ecuador thanks to the support of the following entities: Hora do Povo newspaper, Diálogos do Sul, Barão de Itararé, Portal Vermelho, Correio da Cidadania, Agência Saiba Mais, Intersindical, Central dos Trabalhadores and Workers of Brazil (CTB), Single Central of Workers of Paraná (CUT-PR); Association of Social Workers and Psychologists of the Court of Justice of the State of São Paulo (AASPTJ-SP), Federation of Workers in Credit Companies of Paraná (FETEC-PR), Unions of Workers in Water, Waste and Environment of the State of São Paulo (Sintaema-SP) and Santa Catarina (Sintaema-SC), Union of Workers in the Heavy Construction Industries of the State of Paraná (Sintrapav-PR), Union of Official Education Teachers of the State of São Paulo ( Apeoesp Sudeste-Center), Union of Writers in the State of São Paulo, Union of Workers in the Federal Judiciary Power of Santa Catarina (Sintrajusc-SC); Union of Workers in the Judiciary Power of the State of Santa Catarina (Sinjusc-SC), Union of Workers of the Federal Judiciary Power in Pernambuco (Sintrajuf-PE), popular mandate of councilor Werner Rempel (Santa Maria-RS) and dozens of individual contributions.