02/07/2021 19:18
Clarín.com
World
Updated 02/07/2021 19:31
Ecuador elected president this Sunday among 16 candidates.
The left part like a dolphin from former president Rafael Correa and the right with a former conservative banker.
Both will go to the ballot;
Andrés Aráuz and Guillermo Lasso.
Between the two will be the successor of Lenín Moreno, the unpopular president who changed his allies in power after winning the polls with Correa's support in 2017.
Andres Arauz
He is 35 years old and until recently he presented himself as a "perfect stranger."
But behind Andrés Arauz is the long shadow of Rafael Correa.
The former president deposited in this young economist his options to regain power for the radical and nationalist left.
Arauz headed the Central Bank
and was Minister of Knowledge and Human Talent under Correa (2007-2017).
Andrés Arauz, the delín of Rafael Correa.
Photo: REUTERS
"You are greeted by the perfect stranger who knows and loves Ecuador and who today is committed to bringing our people out of the health and economic crisis," he said on Twitter when he was running for the presidential chair.
He was born in Quito, he is married to Mariana Véliz, with whom he has a son.
He defines himself as a patriot, a democrat and a progressive
.
True to the correista creed, he labels Moreno a traitor.
Arauz speaks English, French and Russian;
plays piano and accordion.
His partner in the race for the presidency was Correa himself, but the former president was disqualified from running for the vice-presidency due to his pending cases with the courts, which sentenced him to
eight years in prison for corruption
.
The journalist Carlos Rabascall replaced Correa as Arauz's running mate for the Unión por la Esperanza (Unes) coalition.
Arauz
promised to pave the way for the return of Correa, who is considered a "politically persecuted
.
"
The former president has been in Belgium - his wife's home country - since he left power in 2017 and while there he has managed to avoid the Ecuadorian justice that, according to him, was manipulated by Moreno.
If the economist wins the elections, he hopes that, under his mandate, the judges will review the cases opened against Correa, although he could also issue a pardon.
Guillermo Lasso
Former conservative banker Guillermo Lasso, 65, leads the opposition to Correismo and is running for the presidency for the third time, after his failed attempts in 2013 and 2017.
"We will turn the page of 21st century socialism (promoted by Correa) and we will enter a stage of full democracy, of freedom," he said.
The candidate Guillermo Lasso, in a campaign event on Thursday.
Photo: REUTERS
On his second attempt for office, he fell behind Moreno by just two percentage points on the ballot.
Lasso is the youngest of 11 siblings in a middle-class family and has catapulted himself into a top banker with just three semesters of economics in tow.
Between 1989 and 2012 he was vice president, manager and president of the private Bank of Guayaquil, one of the largest in Ecuador.
A member of Opus Dei and born in Guayaquil (southwest), he defines himself as "tolerant" and "democratic".
He is married to María de Lourdes Alcívar, with whom he has five children.
Represents his movement Creating Opportunities (I believe) in combination with the doctor Alfredo Borrero.
Lasso maintains that he worked since he was 15 years old, in the Guayaquil Stock Exchange, to pay his Catholic tuition.
In the public area, he was Governor of the Guayas province (capital Guayaquil) and Secretary of State (superminister) for the Economy in the administration of the ousted former president Jamil Mahuad (1998-2000, right).
Source: AFP
CB and PB
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