With more than 60 percent of the votes counted, the president of the National Electoral Council, Diana Atamaint, assured that the observed results already show an irreversible tendency.
The runoff scheduled for October 15 in Ecuador between Luisa Gonzalez, of Revolución Ciudadana (RC), and Daniel Noboa, of the National Democratic Action (ADN) alliance, seemed impossible a few weeks ago and today it is a reality.
Atamaint congratulated the democratic attitude of the presidential candidates who immediately recognized the results, since they are the reflection of the popular will expressed in the ballot boxes.
Before the Sunday vote public surveys indicated that Luisa Gonzalez and right-wing Otto Sonnenholzner were the favorite for a runoff election.
Luisa Gonzalez, of the Citizen Revolution, advances to the second round with around 33 percent of the votes and thus becomes the first woman in Ecuador in a runoff for the presidency of the Republic.
The representative of RC, a political movement led by former president Rafael Correa, seeks to return the country to the days when there was security and a stable economy, with health, education and social development.
The surprise on Sunday night was Daniel Noboa, of the National Democratic Action (ADN) alliance, who in the first polls appeared at the bottom of the public preferences.
The youngest among the presidential hopefuls is a businessman and former legislator. He came unexpectedly in second place in the race and seeks to fulfill the dream of his father, Alvaro Noboa, five times unsuccessful candidate for the presidency.
The six remaining candidates that ran in these elections accepted their defeat.
This Sunday’s voting day concluded with an 82.26 percent turnout and went on without violent incidents, while 100,000 police officers and military servicemen were deployed throughout the country.
This electoral process is taking place in the midst of the biggest wave of insecurity in the country, which even cost the life of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio last August 9, when hired assassins shot him to death as he was leaving a rally.
Although voting here is compulsory for citizens between 18 and 65 years of age, Prensa Latina confirmed that Ecuadorians went to the polls motivated, in search of a change that would allow them to confront this scenario of increasing delinquency, organized crime and economic woes.
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