The running mate of slain Ecuadorian presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio will replace him for the August 20 ballot, their party announced on Saturday. Andrea Gonzalez will be the candidate of the centrist Construye party after the assassination perpetrated on Wednesday.
Mr. Villavicencio, a 59-year-old journalist on a crusade against corruption in his country, who was in second place in the polls on presidential voting intentions, was shot dead as he left an electoral meeting in the capital, Quito. Most of Ecuador has since been under a state of emergency, and President Guillermo Lasso has blamed organized crime for the killing.
Ms Gonzalez, a 36-year-old environmentalist, was a longtime ally of Fernando Villavicencio. “The name of the vice-presidential candidate will be announced in the next few hours, and he will be chosen among the most faithful of those who shared the fights of comrade Fernando Villavicencio”, the party said.
Mme Gonzalez has devoted herself in particular to the defense of the oceans and the mangrove, to the fight against deforestation and the trafficking of wild animals. She must participate Sunday in Quito in a presidential debate. Six Colombians have already been arrested in connection with the investigation into the assassination of Mr. Villavicencio, and one was killed shortly after the attack.
Military and police operation in a prison
Earlier Saturday, nearly 4,000 Ecuadorian soldiers and police took part in an operation inside the prison where Fito, the leader of the country’s most powerful gang, who Fernando Villavicencio accused of threatening him, is being held. These security forces entered at dawn, in armored vehicles, the Number 8 prison in Guayaquil (southwest), where José Adolfo Macías, alias Fito, leader of the powerful Los Choneros gang, has been detained since 2011.
In a photo published by the authorities, he appears from the front, hands on his head. On another he is lying on the ground, in his underwear, with a dozen other prisoners. Fito’s name has been in the headlines in Ecuador since the assassination of Fernando Villavicencio. He claimed last week that the leader of the gang, sentenced to 34 years in prison for murder and drug trafficking, had threatened to kill him.
Drug gangs are powerful in prisons across the country. More than 430 inmates have died in clashes between rival gangs inside facilities since 2021, with dozens dismembered and their bodies burned.