The vote count in Ecuador's special presidential election points to a leftist backed by the country’s fugitive ex-president likely facing a runoff with the son of a banana tycoon.
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    11 months ago

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    GUAYAQUIL, Ecuador (AP) — Ecuadorian voters looking for a new leader to help curb the country’s unprecedented violence will have to head to the polls again in October for a runoff that is likely to see the ally of a convicted former president vie against the principal heir of a banana growing and exporting empire.

    The election process took place under the watch of tens of thousands of police officers and soldiers deployed across the country, partly in response to the assassination of a presidential candidate earlier this month.

    His name was not on the ballot, but he replaced Fernando Villavicencio, whose killing this month as he left a campaign rally in Quito, the capital, laid bare people’s fears over unprecedented violence in a country they considered peaceful up until three years ago.

    He is the son of Alvaro Noboa, who sought Ecuador’s presidency five times and grew an empire based on bananas, the country’s main crop.

    María Cristina Bayas, a professor at the University of the Americas, said Sunday’s results were “unexpected, surprising, but hopeful in a certain way, because they give rise to a new voice, which is Noboa.” She added that he represents an electorate looking for a new political presence with a good academic background.

    Voters were also electing a new National Assembly and deciding two ballot measures — one on whether to stop oil extraction in a portion of the Amazon jungle and the other on whether to authorize the exploitation of minerals such as gold, silver and copper in forests of the Andean Choco around Quito.

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