The murder of the candidate for the president of Ecuador, Fernando Villavicencio, a strong critic of corruption and drug gangs, dealt a new blow to that country already burdened by economic, social and political turmoil, reports Radio Free Europe.
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The attack on Villavicencio showed both the strength and unscrupulousness of the cartel in what used to be one of the safest countries in Latin America, which has become an important stop on cocaine routes to Europe and the USA, the world media write.
State of emergency
Villavicensio was killed on the evening of Wednesday, August 9, during an election rally at a school in the capital, Quito, as political violence threatens to threaten the August 20 election, the Financial Times reports.
Ecuadorian President Guillermo Laso declared a two-month state of emergency and three days of national mourning after a late-night security cabinet meeting.
Laso said the assassination was designed to "sabotage" the election process and linked it to gang violence that has escalated sharply in Ecuador in recent years. He, however, said that the government and democratic institutions will not be left to organized crime, and called on citizens to vote as planned on August 20.
The suspect in the murder of Villavicenci was wounded in an exchange of fire with security officials and later died after his arrest, the state prosecutor announced. Nine other people were injured, including a candidate for parliament and two police officers.
Snap elections for president and parliament were called after Lasso dissolved parliament in May, facing impeachment charges in the opposition-controlled assembly. The embezzlement charges relate to contracts awarded to the state-owned oil transportation company before she took office.
Lasso does not participate in elections.
Villavicensio is an ally of his who favors investor-friendly policies and led investigations into former leftist President Rafael Correa, who led Ecuador from 2007 to 2017.
Regarding the murder, Correa said on Twitter that "Ecuador has become a failed state."
"I hope that those who intend to sow more hatred with this new tragedy will understand that it will only continue to destroy us," wrote the former president of Ecuador.
Several polls have shown that the security crisis in the country is the main concern of voters ahead of the first round of elections on August 20.
Ecuadorian, Mexican and Albanian cartels
Villavicensio has been a harsh critic of the corruption and drug gangs behind the bloodshed that engulfed the once relatively peaceful country, the Wall Street Journal writes.
He said he had recently received threats from a local gang known as the Choneros, which is linked to Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel, which security experts say ensures cocaine shipments from Colombia pass through Ecuador before heading north to the United States.
"It confirms that our campaign proposal would seriously affect these criminal structures," he said, referring to the recent threats. "I'm not afraid."
In the second speech, which was dedicated to the economy, Villavicencio said that for investments it is necessary to "dismantle criminal structures".
"We have a criminal economy financed by drug trafficking, illegal mining and ... bribery from corruption in the public sector," he said.
As a journalist, Villavicencio conducted numerous investigations and wrote books on government corruption, especially during the mandate of Correa, who was convicted in absentia in 2020 of corruption.
Villavicencio was later elected to parliament and headed a supervisory committee that investigated corruption. He was also a harsh critic of Chinese loans to Ecuador, including for large hydroelectric projects.
Once one of the safest countries in Latin America, Ecuador has become one of its most dangerous. Police and security experts say record cocaine production in neighboring Colombia and violence among Ecuadorian drug gangs working with Mexican and Albanian cartels have sparked a wave of violence.
Since 2019, the number of murders in Ecuador has quadrupled, reaching a record 4.800 last year, which has also fueled a rise in migration, mainly to the US.
Violence has increased significantly since 2020, mostly in the coastal city of Guayaquil, as gangs battle to control cocaine trafficking routes to seaports.
Police and locals say gangs are killing prosecutors and police officers, hanging bodies from bridges and recruiting children.
Wolves took responsibility
The cartels have threatened and attacked anyone they consider standing in their way, but the assassination of a presidential candidate at a public event in the capital is the most brazen attack to date and a shocking testimony to the power of the gangs, the BBC says.
Although the Choneros gang, which threatened him last week, was initially suspected of Villavicencio's murder, the Lobos (Los Lobos – wolves) gang claimed responsibility, in a video in which its members wore "phantoms" and brandished weapons.
Lobos, a spinoff from Choneros, is believed to be linked to Mexico's Jalisco New Generation Cartel (Cártel de Jalisco Nueva Generación - CJNG), which trades in cocaine.
Lobos is the second largest gang in Ecuador and has around 8.000 members, many of whom are behind bars. The gang has been involved in a number of recent deadly prison riots, in which scores of inmates have been brutally killed.
The brazen attack stunned Ecuadorians and marked a turning point for a once peaceful country that was recently engulfed by a record level of gang violence, the Washington Post points out, with the assessment that the murder of Villavicencio reminded of the murders of presidential candidates in Colombia and Mexico in the past decades.
The drug trade is out of control in Ecuador, which is located between Colombia and Peru, the two countries with the largest production of cocaine.
The Mexican and Albanian cartels, the newspaper writes, contributed to the initiation of a wave of violence that has not been recorded in the history of Ecuador, with a record number of murders, massacres in prisons and quantities of cocaine sent to Europe and the USA.
A shot in the middle of the turmoil
The murder of Villavicencio, who was among the most vocal candidates on the issue of crime and state corruption, dealt a major blow to a country already burdened by deep economic, social and political turmoil, writes the New York Times.
The country on the western edge of South America underwent remarkable transformations between 2005 and 2015 when millions of people were lifted out of poverty, riding the wave of an oil boom whose profits flowed into education, health care and other social programs.
More recently, however, the country has come to be dominated by an increasingly powerful drug-trafficking industry, the newspaper said, noting that foreign drug gangs have joined forces with local prison and street gangs, unleashing a wave of violence not seen in the country's recent history.
Violence in Ecuador, as the New York Times writes, is often gruesome and public, with the aim of instilling fear and enabling control - car bomb attacks are often reported, but also the killing of children in front of schools.
The situation was further complicated by President Laso when he dissolved the parliament in May. In response to VIljavivensi's murder, Laso declared a 60-day state of emergency across the country, which included restrictions on some civil liberties, and said security forces would be deployed across the country.
However, the New York Times points out, such measures have become more frequent in recent years, but they have contributed little to suppressing the increase in violence in Ecuador.
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