On Sunday (13) night, the National Electoral Council announced that President Daniel Noboa was the winner of the elections, defeating Citizen Revolution candidate Luisa Gonzalez by more than ten percentage points.
In an exclusive interview with Telesur, Citizen Revolution’s vice presidential candidate Diego Borja stated that the Noboa istration used the state apparatus to manipulate the democratic process. The declaration of a “State of Exception” just hours before the start of the voting “violated fundamental rights such as the inviolability of correspondence. It is an unprecedented measure in a democracy,” he said.
“There is no democracy when the State of Exception is used to control elections, persecute opponents, and silence the electoral referee. Ecuador is under an authoritarian regime disguised as legality,” he added.
The leftist economist backed the claims made by Citizen Revolution leader Luisa Gonzalez, who denounced a “grotesque fraud” on Sunday night, highlighting the discrepancies between voting intention polls and the official results:
“Eleven statistical studies, including those sponsored by the government, gave us the victory. None showed the percentage difference that the National Electoral Council now claims exists. In provinces with a strong Indigenous presence, where we expected to increase our vote share, the number actually decreased! It’s impossible that eleven polls were wrong,” Borja said.
“Isn’t it unbelievable that our vote count didn’t grow by even a single vote in some regions? The numbers are incoherent. This wasn’t an error—it was a scandalous fraud,” he added, calling the National Electoral Council an accomplice for failing to act on the irregularities.
“The electoral referee should have flagged the democratic violations and even imposed sanctions, including the disqualification of the ruling party’s candidate. We denounced violations on multiple occasions, but there was complicit silence,” said Borja, who reported that the electoral anomalies were documented and submitted to election observers from the Organization of American States and the European Union:
“In a democracy, it’s not normal for the CNE to allow such a number of violations. Why didn’t it act? Because it serves those in power,” he accused, emphasizing that Gonzalez’s presidential candidacy received even from sectors outside of correismo.
“Indigenous organizations, the traditional left, and even the right ed us. For the first time in years, there was hope for reconciliation. But the fraud seeks to destroy that unity,” he emphasized and announced that Citizen Revolution will challenge the election results before both national and international bodies.
“We will continue fighting, although we have little faith in the domestic electoral referee. We demand that the OAS and the EU audit the tally sheets and the ballot boxes,” he said.
“Ecuador cannot be governed by those who hate their own people. We ask the world not to ignore this dictatorship. Luisa Gonzalez is the legitimate president!” Borja emphasized.
