A presidential candidate from Ecuador known for speaking out against corruption was shot dead on Wednesday during a political gathering in the South Ameriacan country.
President Guillermo Lasso acknowledged Fernando Villavicencio’s assassination and suggested organized crime was responsible, less than two weeks before the August 20 presidential election.
“I assure you that this crime will not go unpunished,” Lasso said in a statement. “Organized crime has gone too far, but they will feel the full weight of the law.”
Prior to the shooting, Villavicencio claimed he had received numerous death threats, including from officials of Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel, an international criminal gang operating in Ecuador.
Villavicencio was one of eight candidates, but he wasn’t a frontrunner. The 59-year-old politician was a candidate of the Build Ecuador Movement. According to Ecuador’s attorney general’s office, a suspect in Villavicencio’s assassination died of injuries after being captured.
Ecuador, a typically peaceful country, has seen an increase in violence in the last year as drug traffickers come to the South American country, resulting in a troubling increase in drug trafficking, violent deaths, and child trafficking by gangs.
Social media videos show the candidate leaving the event accompanied by security. The footage then shows Villavicencio getting into a white pickup truck, followed by gunfire and activity around the vehicle. Patricio Zuquilanda, Villavicencio’s campaign adviser, confirmed the series of events to The Associated Press.
According to Zuquilanda, the candidate got at least three death threats before the actual shooting, which he reported to authorities, resulting in one arrest. He urged international authorities to intervene in the crisis, blaming it on escalating violence and drug trafficking.
“The Ecuadorian people are crying, and Ecuador is mortally wounded,” he declared. “Politics cannot lead to the death of any member of society.”
Other contenders requested action in response to the assassination, with presidential frontrunner Luisa González of the Citizen Revolution party saying, “When they touch one of us, they touch all of us.”
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