ECUADOR:Rafael Correa shows no restraint in a campaign against those blamed for Ecuador's economic collapse, writes Joshua Partlowin Quito.
THE TIP came to the old journalist at midnight about the decision at the presidential palace: The police were on their way.
Lolo Echeverria in turn called his colleagues at Gamavision, one of Ecuador's prominent television stations, who drove to the studio through the deserted streets of Quito under the looming mass of an Andean volcano. They were in time to see police scale the white metal fence, break locks and force their way into the offices - the beginning of a swift government takeover of more than 190 businesses earlier this month that has captivated this small and volatile nation.
Gamavision went blank briefly on the morning of the takeover, Echeverria said. In one of his last acts as vice president of news, he ordered that the word "censored" appear on the screen. Within a few seconds, he said, the warning disappeared.
"We've had dictatorships, governments of ultra-right and ultra-left," said Echeverria, who spent 32 years at two television stations before resigning on July 8th. "But there has never been a problem between the government and the media like with this administration." The government of President Rafael Correa has characterised the takeover of those companies, including television stations watched by about 40 per cent of the news audience, as a long-overdue strike for justice against corrupt businessmen who owe Ecuador millions. It is a move consistent with the rhetoric of the "citizens' revolution" declared by Correa, a former economy minister who refused to move out of his home in a middle-class neighbourhood when elected president, and who aligns himself with left-leaning governments in Venezuela and Bolivia.
In Ecuador, "economic power has always prevailed over political power," said Julio Cesar Trujillo, a constitutional law professor in Quito. "In this moment, political power is taking revenge." Government officials said the companies are all part of the Isaias Group, run by brothers and former Ecuadoran bankers Roberto and William Isaias, who now live in Florida, and are accused of owing $661 million (€417 million) to the Ecuadoran state and to the customers of Filanbanco, which crashed as part of Ecuador's financial collapse a decade ago.
Attempts to prosecute the brothers on embezzlement charges have dragged on for years, amid charges of judicial corruption and malfeasance. For many in Ecuador, the Isaias brothers have become a symbol of why this country remains mired in poverty.
The government, which wants the United States to extradite the brothers, intends not to nationalise the companies but instead to sell them off to recoup losses, said Fernando Bustamante, Ecuador's minister of government.
"We believe that justice requires that all those people who have defrauded their clients and the state answer with their assets," Bustamante said. "We are defending those who have been robbed.
"For nine years, the Isaias family has had an enormous control over the politics, the authorities, over the judges," Bustamante added. "And this has prevented us from acting, until very recently." Not everyone has gone along happily. There were protests at some companies, as well as claims that the Isaias Group did not actually own some of the businesses. Finance minister Fausto Ortiz refused to sign off on the takeovers and resigned during a late-night meeting in the presidential palace on July 8th, hours before police mobilised to seize the companies, according to government officials.
Still, polls suggest that a majority of Ecuadorans approve of the seizures.
"I think that this is something that Ecuador was demanding for about 10 years, and basically no one had the guts to do it," said Ana Maria Correa, a political analyst and newspaper columnist in Quito. "The Isaias family had the justice system taken over basically through mafia-type actions."
The Isaias brothers, who could not be reached for comment, have previously denied wrongdoing and claimed they have become political scapegoats for the dire economic conditions in Ecuador in the late 1990s, during which many banks failed.
Another relative, Estefano Isaias, has sought asylum in the United States following the seizures of the companies.
"We are living in a dictatorship," he said.
For many Ecuadorans, the takeovers are difficult to separate from what is happening 160 miles west and nearly 9,000 feet below Quito, in the low hills along the humid Pacific coast. In Montecristi, a town best known for making Panama hats, the 130-member national assembly is in the final days of writing a new constitution for Ecuador, a major initiative for Correa.
Several political observers have said the president seized the companies to further his political agenda and ensure the passage of the new constitution in a September referendum.
"The timing is very clear, because the government was going down in the polls. There's no doubt this was used politically," said Pablo Lucio Paredes, a former government minister who is a member of the assembly.
"For the government, to have the yes (vote) in the referendum is basic, basic, basic. They will do anything to have the yes."
If approved, the new constitution could allow Correa to be elected to two consecutive four-year terms - in addition to the 18 months he has completed - for a potential 10-year run in a country that has had eight presidents in a decade and currently gives them no more than four consecutive years. Correa's opponents believe a new constitution would lead to more state control of the economy, redistribution of land and greater presidential control, while scaring away investment.
His supporters say that it will lead to stronger regulation to control corruption, and greater attention to the environment and the poor.
"The fact is that there are two (television) channels of national reach that are in the hands of the state, and that are administered by managers designated by the state, and they are probably going to be very open to the public propaganda in these months before the referendum," said Adrián Bonilla, a political analyst and the director of FLACSO, a Latin American graduate school and think tank based in Quito.
"I don't think they'll sell them before the referendum."
- (LA Times-Washington Post)