Ecuador’s incumbent President Daniel Noboa has declared victory in Sunday’s presidential runoff election, securing a commanding lead over leftist challenger Luisa Gonzalez, who has since alleged electoral fraud and demanded a recount.
With over 90% of the ballots counted, the National Election Council reported that Noboa held a 12-point lead, capturing 56% of the vote compared to Gonzalez’s 44% — a significantly wider margin than analysts had predicted after a closely contested first round.
Speaking to a jubilant crowd of supporters in his coastal hometown of Olon, the 37-year-old leader called the result a “historic victory.”;
“A huge hug to all those Ecuadorians who always believed in this young president!”; Noboa said. “Ecuadorians have spoken. From tomorrow morning, we will go to work.”;
Gonzalez, who had hoped to become Ecuador’s first female president, swiftly rejected the results, accusing Noboa of orchestrating “the most grotesque electoral fraud.”;
“I refuse to believe that the people prefer lies over the truth,”; she said in a speech to her supporters in Guayaquil, while calling for an immediate recount.
However, she provided no concrete evidence to support her allegations.
The runoff vote was dominated by concerns over surging cartel violence and economic stagnation.
Ecuador, once considered one of the safest countries in Latin America, has in recent years seen a sharp rise in drug-related killings and gang activity, with violence averaging nearly one homicide per hour at the start of the year.
Noboa, the son of a wealthy banana magnate, ran on a hardline security platform, vowing to crush the cartels with military force. His administration has already declared several states of emergency and brought in U.S. support to combat the escalating violence.
On the eve of the vote, Noboa once again imposed a 60-day state of emergency across the capital, Quito, and other key provinces, citing the precarious security environment.
“I think Ecuador is divided, but I think we all understand we’re in a situation where we have to unite, whoever is leading the government,”; said 21-year-old voter Camila Medina outside a polling station in Quito.
Roughly 13.7 million Ecuadorans were eligible to vote in the high-stakes election.
Noboa’s decisive victory is expected to strengthen his mandate and allow him to expand his “iron fist”; policies. Supporters are hopeful that he will now have the political capital to push through critical reforms.
“These next four years, I hope everything goes well,”; said 26-year-old Natalie Ulloa. “I hope he manages to better implement what he has been proposing from the beginning.”;
Analysts suggest Gonzalez’s ties to former President Rafael Correa — currently living in exile in Belgium to avoid a corruption sentence — may have alienated swing voters.
“There is a strong anti-Correa sentiment among some voters,”; said Ruth Hidalgo, a political scientist at the University of the Americas. “Gonzalez and her party didn’t manage to overcome that; they didn’t connect with the electorate.”;
While international observers have yet to report major irregularities in the vote, Gonzalez’s fraud claims are likely to prolong tensions in the politically fractured nation.
