Presidential Candidate in Ecuador Is Assassinated During Rally

A presidential candidate in Ecuador was killed on Wednesday night when gunfire burst by means of a political rally within the capital, Quito, simply days earlier than an election that has centered across the nation’s more and more dire safety scenario.

The dying of the candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, was confirmed by President Guillermo Lasso. Mr. Villavicencio was a former journalist who was polling close to the center of the eight folks working, and was among the many most outspoken candidates on the hyperlink between organized crime and authorities officers.

Ecuador, a as soon as comparatively secure nation, has been consumed by violence associated to narcotrafficking within the final 5 years. Yet Mr. Villavicencio’s assassination introduced the nation to a brand new degree of worry and grief: Never earlier than has a presidential candidate been assassinated on the marketing campaign path.

“Outraged and shocked by the assassination,” Mr. Lasso wrote on Twitter late Wednesday, blaming the dying on “organized crime.”

Mr. Villavicencio, 59, had been at an area highschool, the place he had addressed younger supporters.

Carlos Figueroa, a member of his marketing campaign who was on the rally, witnessed the capturing.

“When he stepped outside the door, he was met with gunfire,” Mr. Figueroa stated. “There was nothing to be done, because they were shots to the head.”

The killing shocked a nation that had not completed dealing with the lack of one other vital political determine. Just weeks in the past, Agustín Intriago, 38, the mayor of Manta, a key Ecuadorean port metropolis, was killed on a go to to a Manta neighborhood.

“We are at the last step of social degradation,” stated Rafael Balda, a political analyst in Ecuador. “It is important to note that this is not an isolated event.”

Mr. Villavicencio, who had labored as a journalist, activist and legislator, gained prominence as an opponent of correísmo, the leftist motion of former President Rafael Correa, who served from 2007 to 2017 and nonetheless holds political sway in Ecuador.

In 2017 he efficiently ran for a seat within the National Assembly the place he served till the legislature was dissolved earlier this yr by Mr. Lasso, who referred to as for brand new presidential and legislative elections.