A group of people show their support for Guillermo Lasso, the presidential candidate promoted by the right-wing.Fernando Vergara / AP
With or without Rafael Correa on the rival ballot, the Ecuadorian right seeks to guarantee itself the assault on power in the next elections.
Ecuador's voters have around twenty options for the 2021 presidential elections, but only three have real aspirations to win.
Two of them, those with a conservative tendency, sealed a pact this week to launch a single candidate and face the third force with possibilities: the one sponsored by the former president.
The CREO (Creating Opportunities) movement and the Social Christian Party (PSC) will support the leader of the former, Guillermo Lasso, 64, in his third attempt to lead the Latin American country.
"The only enemy we seek to defeat with this alliance is the poverty and lack of employment that afflict millions of Ecuadorians," Lasso responds when asked if the new alliance arises to try to stop the return of Rafael Correa, 57, to the power.
While the electoral authorities finally decide whether or not they accept that the former president can participate in the electoral call without stepping on the country, despite the fact that the internal regulations of the elections require it, the agreement of the right was formalized in a document with seven points, a defining preamble and five signatures.
"It is public that among the supporters and sympathizers of CREO and the PSC there are certain conceptual and even personal differences, but these are secondary," the introduction includes, given priorities such as democracy, freedom, employment or prosperity that "are in serious danger ”.
For this reason, Guillermo Lasso, candidate of the Liberals, Cristina Reyes, Christian Social aspirant, the presidents of both groups, César Monge (CREO) and Pascual del Cioppo (PSC);
and Jaime Nebot, as a witness and historical reference of social Christianity, confirmed the political alliance that the most conservative voters had been asking for since the last call to the polls.
In 2017, Correa left Lenín Moreno as his successor, after a decade of government under the postulates of the so-called Socialism of the XXI Century.
Lasso and Moreno then fought a very tight second round of elections that, according to the criticisms of the liberal economic trend, would have been avoided if the vote of the right had not been divided and Lasso had been able to win in the first round.
But the polls gave the current president victory and, despite the fact that he distanced himself during his term from his predecessor, CREO and the PSC are presented as a solution to the inherited problems.
"We have attended to the majority sentiment of Ecuadorians, who asked for unity to face the serious problems that affect us as a country," defends Lasso about the decision taken.
Looking ahead to 2021, the Social Christians -who have deep roots in the coastal region after 30 years ruling in Guayaquil, the economic capital of Ecuador- will give prominence and promote Lasso along with his candidate for vice president, the doctor Alfredo Borrero.
But the lists for the National Assembly will be independent and the two parties will have their own cadres.
"It is necessary to make it clear that, with respect to the government plan, which will be the responsibility of the President of the Republic to prepare and execute, and to the actions of the National Assembly, the already known coincidences and differences will be maintained."
In other words, there will not be a common legislative bench.
The third political trend with presidential aspirations - the other candidacies mainly choose to open space in the Assembly - is that of the United for Hope coalition.
They are the acronyms that will shelter the presidential duo of Rafael Correa, despite not yet having the certainty of being able to count on him for the leadership.
The former president, who lives in Belgium and is serving an eight-year prison sentence for a pending bribery case, has until Thursday to formally accept his candidacy as vice president.
But to do so, you must give your consent in person in Ecuador, at the risk of being caught by the authorities.
His sister Pierina, who will also participate in the elections as head of the list to the National Assembly, tried this Tuesday to complete this process acting as attorney-in-fact, delivering documents signed electronically and accompanied by Correa himself through a video call.
But the electoral authority required that this request be delivered to the central offices to see if the exception is allowed.
That decision will depend on whether the new alliance of the right will be measured in votes directly with the former president or with a pair of new faces supported by her from a distance.