Candidates wearing bulletproof vests, motorcades under gunfire and soldiers patrolling polling booths are not images typical of Ecuadorean elections — though Sunday’s vote is anything but normal.
When centre-right presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio was shot dead while leaving a rally in Quito last week, the atmosphere around the South American nation’s snap election changed instantly. Pledges to tackle gang violence and a drug-fuelled crime wave became key to voting intentions in the Andean nation of 18mn people.
Villavicencio, formerly a reporter who uncovered graft during the governments of Rafael Correa, had long been a target of the former socialist president’s ire. On walls around the capital Quito, graffiti labels Correa as a “murderer”. Some political experts pin the blame on crime bosses, while authorities say they are pursuing the “intellectual authors” of the attack.
“Given how bad things are, I’m scared for myself and my children,” said Rebeca Córdova, an unemployed housekeeper who said security was the election’s most important issue, followed by the economy. “I haven’t decided who I’ll vote for, but it won’t be the left.”
Luisa González, Correa’s leftwing protégé, had been considered the frontrunner before Villavicencio’s murder and a media blackout on polling but has been damaged by her association with her mentor, boosting the chances of her centre-right rivals, analysts said.
“Rightly or wrongly, people blame Correismo for Villavicencio’s murder,” said Sebastián Hurtado, head of Ecuadorean political risk consultancy Prófitas. “The Correistas have gone from having a shot at winning in a single round to having to fight to stay in a much more competitive second round.”

Correa lives in exile in Belgium following a 2020 conviction on corruption charges. His presidency from 2007-17 was marked by a shift away from Ecuador’s close ties to the US, his government taking about $18bn of loans from Chinese banks, and vocal attacks on political rivals, journalists and critics.
“You’re a shameless coward,” Correa tweeted at Villavicencio last November when the latter was serving as a lawmaker. “Soon your party will be over.”
Sunday’s snap election was triggered by President Guillermo Lasso in May when he dissolved congress to avoid impeachment charges from opposition lawmakers. This triggered elections for both a new congress and a new president to serve the remainder of the current term, until 2025.
Given the packed field of eight candidates and the fragmentation of Ecuador’s political parties, pollsters say a second presidential round between the two frontrunners in October is likely.
The next president of the oil and shrimp exporter will face a widening fiscal deficit, lower energy revenues and higher interest on debt repayments. Rating agency Fitch this week downgraded its credit score to CCC+, seven notches below investment grade, citing the country’s political uncertainty.
Also on the ballot are two referendum questions that would halt oil drilling at an Amazon field and mining in vast tracts of land near Quito known as the ChocĂł Andino. Voters are expected to approve both bans.
But most candidates are jostling to appear the toughest on crime as the once-peaceful country is roiled by drug-related violence, last year causing the per capita homicide rate to surpass those of Colombia and Mexico.
Some 3,500 homicides have been reported in the first six months of this year, according to police statistics. Last year, 4,800 people were murdered, almost double the rate in 2021 and quadruple that of 2018, the interior ministry said.
“This government has done nothing to stop the crime which has us all terrified,” said Carlos Ochoa, a doorman in Quito who plans to vote for Christián Zurita, who took Villavicencio’s place as the eighth candidate.
“I’m not afraid but neither will I let them kill me,” Zurita — also a former investigative journalist — told the Financial Times at his home in the north of Quito, disclosing the location just a few minutes ahead of time. Outside, a dozen police officers and bodyguards stand guard, some wielding assault rifles.
Zurita keeps a bulletproof vest by the front door, near a black-and-white portrait of Villavicencio. His wife and children are in hiding in different parts of the country.
“Criminal groups could take control of the vote count in areas where they operate. That would be enough to tilt an election,” Zurita said, citing this as “the big risk”.
Analysts say the violence was fomented in the country’s overcrowded prisons before spilling on to the streets — Correa slashed budgets for police and prisons due to low violent crime rates. Colombian groups were also able to exploit the socialist leader’s more permissive attitude to drug trafficking to consolidate routes along Ecuador’s Pacific coastline.

In the port city of Guayaquil, protests broke out over the transfer of jailed gang leader Adolfo “Fito” MacĂas to a maximum-security prison last weekend. Before his assassination, Villavicencio said he had received threats from Fito’s gang.
Jan Topić, a hardline candidate and former sniper in the Foreign French Legion, told the FT that he would empower authorities to take control of the prisons.
“We are not trying to reinvent the wheel here,” said Topic, whose family controls a telecommunications company. “Fito runs the largest criminal group from prison and no one cuts his signal.”
Topic was not sure who he would back if he fails to advance on Sunday, though he added that “the thought of Correismo returning to power makes me shiver”.
If González makes the second round as expected. a four-candidate coalition — including indigenous leader Yaku Pérez, businessman Daniel Noboa and former vice-president Otto Sonnenholzner — has pledged to unite if one of the quartet faces the leftwinger.
In Quito’s financial district, architect Gabriela Valdiviezo said she would vote for any centre-right candidate against González.
A vote for the socialists “would be one of the worst decisions Ecuador could take”, she said. “It would hurt investment and opportunities for the country.”
But at a González rally on Wednesday in a working-class Quito neighbourhood, the mood was convivial. Marco Cumanicho, a teacher, said González represented a chance for Ecuador to return to the safer times during Correa’s tenure. “Ten years ago we were a peaceful country and now we’re drowning in violence,” he said. “Luisa can get us back there.”
When González took to the stage, following a rabble-rousing video message from Correa, she was flanked by police officers holding up bulletproof shields.Â
“Today, we are known for our death statistics,” González said to applause. “We are going to strengthen our patriotic public security force and bring dignity back.”