Amid the shock over the brutal murder of Ecuador's presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio, the leader's wife said that "the country is going to hell" and called for "a civil war."
"Things are done, the country is going to hell. What there must be here is a civil war. That the men put their pants tightly tied and the women, who are braver, we have to show our bravery, our courage, otherwise the country goes to the abyss," Sarauz said.
And he closed: "This should not remain in impunity, this should make us react as a country and stop stupid and divide the votes, to go with the one that offers the most."
In the message after the brutal murder of her husband, Saráuz also maintains that "the security team failed."
Lorena Villavicencio, the sister of the murdered leader. Photo: AFP
"The head of logistics failed, the head of security failed. Fernando should have left through the back parking lot as General Carrillo did, with an escort of police. They should have taken him out with an armored car and not let him leave through the Gaspar de Villarroel in a sad truck, and it was not armored, and they killed him," she said in tears.
Villavicencio, 59, was killed by three shots to the head after a party meeting he led Wednesday in Quito.
Villavicencio, a national assemblyman and candidate for the Construye Movement, had led a rally in Quito. At the end of the meeting a group of hitmen – as described by local media – shot at the candidate opposed to Correismo, while he was getting into a van.
Villavicencio was the only presidential candidate who, by his own decision, did not have the police custody that the government offered to all candidates.
He had recently publicly and repeatedly denounced the receipt of death threats against him and his campaign. According to him, the person responsible for the intimidation was the leader of a local narco group that would have relations with the Sinaloa cartel.
In the early hours of Thursday, a group of armed men with their faces covered released a video in which they assume responsibility for the attack and issue threats.
In the message, the group identified as Los Lobos — a gang linked to Mexico's Jalisco drug cartel — takes credit for the crime that shocked the country ten days before the August 20 presidential and legislative elections.
In the message, other Ecuadorian politicians threaten, among whom he especially mentions Jan Topic, one of the presidential candidates who based his campaign on the hard hand against insecurity.
The hooded man who read the statement also warned the Ecuadorian people that the group will crack down on corrupt politicians who fail to keep their promises or use millions of dollars to finance their election campaigns.
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