EspañolThis is a day to celebrate together. Over the past seven years, the Ecuadorian people have learned a lot about Rafael Correa, and today the president is reaping what he has sown.
Thanks to his opening speech on how a government must always carry out its electoral mandate, people no longer buy into such misleading rhetoric and demand their right to participate in important decisions that affect the country’s present and future.
Bravo Rafael!
It is abundantly clear that we do not want you as an eternal candidate, nor anyone who wants to perpetuate the length of his rule for that matter. We are not going to take to the streets to protest, because we run the risk of you unjustly imprisoning us. But that is not to say that our creativity has been stunted. Now more than ever, we are aware of the value of the popular vote.
Than you very much, Rafael!
If you made us believe that it was important to go to the polls to say no to bull and cock fights, how could you even think that we would not consider the issue of indefinite reelection to be important?
The awareness and the discomfort of the Ecuadorian people has reached unprecedented levels. According to polls, 53 percent of the public would not vote for you if the National Assembly that you control votes to allow indefinite reelection.
Thanks to the shameful manipulation that you have employed in your second term, Ecuadorians now demand that the lists of candidates to delegates be made up of qualified and honest people. I am sure that many people will do the job of looking over the resumes of every aspiring candidate to avoid repeating this political puppet show.
Thanks to you Rafael, we have matured politically.
After seven years of unbearable propaganda, your aggressive and tasteless style has made us sick to death.
After seven years of unbearable propaganda, your aggressive and tasteless style has made us sick to death. At the start, this style may have seemed interesting to some people. Now, most people recognize that discrediting other people that you consider to be enemies is the main strategy that you use to remain in power. This is highly frowned upon these days. You made the grave error of putting workers, students, and social leaders on a black list — the very same people that were key in your election as president. In other words, you threw your friends under the bus.
Today, you and the rest of the politicians in Ecuador know that you can’t buy people’s votes for a measly US$50 per month, and that there is no price on loyalty. We are also not willing to let the state blatantly steal food out of the mouths of Ecuadorean citizens, just to maintain absurd levels of spending aimed only at keeping the ruling class in power.
Each time you and your propaganda apparatus make us believe that there is a secret plan to topple the government, we deeply reflect and understand that we gain nothing by overthrowing presidents. Democracy must be respected, and we are not going to support any coup d’état. On the contrary, we want you to finish your term and be held accountable to the electorate before leaving office.
It is a pity that you have not understood that in order to maintain your political agenda you should have helped new leaders develop. But, what did you do instead? You let a small group of cronies take turns in power. The fear that you have of anyone supplanting you in popularity or skill is very evident. Your magical formula of change that was supposedly made up of a bottle of your perfume, plus seven droplets and a pinch of you, turned out to be bothersome and sickeningly sweet.
We hoped that the verde flex (PAIS Alliance) formula would give way to something fresher and less bothersome. But it resulted in nothing. No matter how much propaganda you use to promote Vice President Jorge Glas, the man is not convincing us; he lacks the charisma. And although the requirements for being president have drastically changed, your pupil Mrs. Gabriela will not be able to succeed you, because her record is already open for the public to see. We now know who she is. And please tell Rolando Panchana that every time he goes on television, we end up liking Mayor Jaime Nebot even more instead of him.
And as far as I am concerned, I would like to thank you very much Rafael Correa. Now more than ever, we journalists know that for every piece of bad propaganda that our rulers try to use on us, the more people will continue to believe in the independent press. Now we are no longer afraid, because we have confirmed that the power of the word is invincible.
Article originally published in UbicaTV. Translated by José Niño and Rebeca Morla.