Ecuador presidential election: President Noboa fails to win majority, to face run-off in April

Ecuador’s April presidential run-off will put incumbent Daniel Noboa against leftist Luisa Gonzalez in an unusually close race between the same two candidates who ran in a 2023 snap election.

Noboa, the 37-year-old heir of a corporate empire, was expected to win in the majority of surveys; some even anticipated that he would win in one round. On Sunday, however, he was less than a point ahead of Gonzalez, and the two were on the verge of a runoff, which may give the third and fourth-place candidates the position of kingmakers.

After counting over 92% of the voting boxes, Noboa’s share was 44.3%, while Gonzalez’s was 43.8%.

Noboa promised to “fight like it was the first day” and praised what he said was a triumph over “Old Ecuador” in a written statement released Monday morning. On Sunday night, he didn’t address his followers.

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During his 15 months in office, Noboa has pledged to continue using the military on the streets and in prisons to combat instability. He has also campaigned on a 15% drop in violent fatalities, a decrease in jail violence, and the apprehension of key gang leaders.

Gonzalez, a 47-year-old communist, and Noboa’s 14 other first-round opponents, however, demanded greater measures to combat the drug-related criminality that has shook Ecuador in recent years.

Gonzalez, a protege of former President Rafael Correa, has said she would fight crime with major military and police operations, pursue corrupt judges and prosecutors and roll out a social spending plan in the most violent areas.

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“We always planned on a second round,” Gonzalez said in a Monday morning interview with television channel Teleamazonas, adding she was seeking unity.

“The votes that we obtained in this first phase of the election shows that people want change, that they are not willing to support four more years of what we have lived this year and a half,” she said.

Ecuador’s government bonds plunged as they resumed trading on Monday, on the two months of uncertainty now facing the country before the run-off.

Indigenous leader Leonidas Iza, who led protests that nearly unseated Noboa’s predecessor, was tallying 5.26% of the votes, while Andrea Gonzalez, once the vice presidential candidate for an assassinated anti-corruption crusader, won 2.7%.

Iza, congratulated by Luisa Gonzalez in remarks on Sunday night, is seen as unlikely to back Noboa, whom he has accused of improvising his policies and of wanting to privatize state assets. But he has also heavily criticized Correa.

Iza said on Sunday night his movement would decide collectively who to support in the run-off.

Andrea Gonzalez, who is no relation to Luisa Gonzales, was running with Fernando Villavicencio in 2023 when he was shot while leaving a campaign rally.

Villavicencio was vocally opposed to Correa, who, like several major figures in his decade-long government, has been convicted of graft but has always denied wrongdoing.

Andrea Gonzalez ran this time for the movement of former President Lucio Gutierrez, who has said he would support Noboa in a second round. She told Teleamazonas in her own interview on Monday morning she would not hold dialogue with “21st-century socialism”, a reference to Correa’s movement.

For days, Correa and Luisa Gonzalez have been decrying what they called plans for election fraud, with Gonzalez singling out the head of the national electoral council, saying she had allowed Noboa to ignore campaign rules.

Gonzalez doubled down on the accusations on Monday morning, saying there were inconsistencies in the count, though she provided no details.

Noboa has been embroiled in a long-running spat with his vice president, most recently over whether Noboa could take campaign leave.

This week the constitutional court ruled invalid two decrees Noboa used to take the leave, a result likely to complicate his ability to name an interim vice president so he can campaign in the run-off.

The race for control of the national assembly legislature mirrored the tight contest for president - Noboa’s National Democratic Movement has 43.5% of seats, while Correa’s Citizens’ Revolution 41.2%, with nearly 90% of ballot boxes counted.