QUITO – Former banker Guillermo Lasso won Ecuador’s presidential election yesterday after his socialist opponent Andres Arauz conceded.
The conservative Lasso declared himself president-elect and accepted the “challenge” of changing the country’s “destiny”.
With 93% of votes counted, Lasso held a lead of almost five percentage points over economist Arauz.
“On May 24, we will assume with responsibility the challenge of changing our country’s destiny and achieving for all (of) Ecuador the opportunities and prosperity we all yearn for,” said Lasso.
Arauz, best known as the protege of former president Rafael Correa, was magnanimous despite earlier claiming victory following a tight exit poll.
“I congratulate him on his electoral triumph today, and I will show him our democratic convictions.”
Lasso had 52.51% of the vote to Arauz’s 47.49% with 93.14% of the votes counted, said the National Electoral Council.
Seasoned politician Lasso, 65, has twice before finished second in presidential votes.
Earlier, television stations Ecuavisa and Teleamazonas published the results of the Cedatos exit poll that gave Lasso a lead of almost 6.5 percentage points over Arauz.
But, they also said the Clima Social pollsters indicated that the result was a technical draw, and thus, decided not to publish their figures.
Arauz’s campaign team used that poll to claim victory by 1.6 percentage points.
“Thank you, Ecuador! This is a victory for the Ecuadoran people,” he tweeted.
“No one will prevent the course of history.”
Voting is obligatory, and opinion polls had the rivals neck and neck heading into the election for oil-rich Ecuador’s 13.1 million registered voters to pick a successor to the deeply unpopular Lenin Moreno.
The campaign in the South American country was dominated by an economic crisis aggravated by the Covid-19 pandemic. – AFP, April 12, 2021
