Around thirty representatives of left-wing collectives in Ecuador protested this Tuesday against the advancement of local elections, which will now take place in November, and against the possibility of certain political groups being removed from the electoral ballot. Isabel Vargas, affiliated with the Unidad Popular (UP) party, asserted that they came to protest outside the National Electoral Council (CNE) «in defense of democracy that is being trampled by the president of the republic, Daniel Noboa, and by his political operator Diana Atamaint», president of the CNE. Atamaint presided over the plenary session of the CNE on March 27, where, with four of the five possible votes, it was decided to move forward the local elections to November 29, initially scheduled for February 14, 2027, to avoid problems from a potential El Niño phenomenon. «We are against the arbitrary advancement of the elections since winter cannot be predicted so many months in advance, and if they did, why hasn't the Government done anything to predict, for example, the issue of blackouts?», Vargas said while recalling that Ecuador has endured power outages on other occasions due to climatic problems. For this, she described the CNE's decision as «brazen» and considered it a «mockery of the Ecuadorian people». Vargas also demanded that the CNE present the evidence for the alleged disaffiliations of the UP movement: «It's not a matter of taking away the ballot boxes from certain political parties». In the local elections, Ecuadorians will designate 5,742 authorities. In addition to urban and rural councilors, in the elections Ecuadorians will elect prefects and vice-prefectors; mayors; vocal members of rural parish boards; and authorities of the Citizen Participation and Social Control Council (CPCCS) for the 2027-2031 period. Geovanni Atarihuana, national director of UP, stated that they are demonstrating outside the CNE to demand «that the process for the elimination of Unidad Popular be archived». «It is proven that we have 206,000 members as a political party, fruit of the merger with the MPD», he said when noting that Atamaint, «who approved the merger in 2020, cannot deny 173,000 members coming from the MPD». Likewise, he said that the CNE has not delivered any proof of any disaffiliation and commented that on April 3 the deadline for the CNE to cancel a political organization expired. «Unidad Popular lives, it will continue alongside the people, demanding medicines in hospitals, against the high cost of living, for an education budget, for labor rights, and against an incapable, lying, and corrupt government», said Atarihuana. He announced that UP will participate in the end-of-year elections: «Let Daniel Noboa and his political instrument Diana Atamaint know that in the 2026 elections they will receive the punishment with the vote of the Ecuadorian people». Last Saturday, the Contentious Electoral Tribunal (TCE) admitted for processing an appeal filed on March 30 by Assemblyman Alfredo Serrano, president of the conservative Social Christian Party (PSC), against the CNE's decision to advance the local elections, in order to revoke said measure.
