A presidential candidate in Ecuador was killed on Wednesday night when gunfire burst by way 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 individuals 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. But Mr. Villavicencio’s assassination introduced the nation to a brand new stage of worry and grief: By no means 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 a neighborhood 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 outdoors the door, he was met with gunfire,” Mr. Figueroa stated. “There was nothing to be accomplished, as a result of they had been pictures to the top.”
The killing shocked a nation that had not completed dealing with the lack of one other essential political determine. Simply 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’re on the final step of social degradation,” stated Rafael Balda, a political analyst in Ecuador. “It is very important observe that this isn’t an remoted occasion.”
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 Nationwide Meeting the place he served till the legislature was dissolved earlier this yr by Mr. Lasso, who referred to as for brand spanking new presidential and legislative elections.
