Leonel Allegues, from UBER driver and construction worker to international correspondent for Ecuador: Cuban communicator returns to television

His last appearance on Ecuadorian television was in TC television. His light personality in front of the cameras was combined with that of his compatriot Mariaca Valdés, to become his partner in the cooking segment, as part of the program From house to house. And although he has been living in the United States for a year, his name has violently resounded on domestic screens because he is responsible for the videos in which Alejandra Jaramillo allegedly appears kissing the Colombian influencer Beta Mejía.

Cuban communicator Leonel Allegues In Miami, the city where he stayed with his parents, he found inspiration to continue working as a journalist and now as a content creator for digital platforms. “After I left TC television I had fears and doubts, I thought that I had finished my television or at least media career, but as I was in the media before, I heard about people who create content for social networks and it always seemed to me to be an important field for me to enter I wanted to get involved myself,” Allegues says of his interest in digital platforms.

After leaving TC, job opportunities in the country led him to other scenarios. Interviews with celebrities and artists fell behind, and he immersed himself in the sale of consumer goods on the Internet and was the host of a bingo program on Facebook (from Portoviejo). All this while increasing the number of followers on social networks.

After 23 years of living in Ecuador, Allegues assures that it is a country he feels is his because of all the opportunities it has offered him since he arrived as an 11-year-old boy. That is why it is common to hear him in his interviews on social networks approaching world stars like Chayanna and questioning them about their memories from this country.

Nephew of the singer and director of the group Allegues Son, thanks to his fruitful experience his family managed to come to the country. “My uncle stayed in Guayaquil, after two years of his stay my father also left, and from there my brother and mother left. We lived there in Guayaquil, I also remember in Tungurahua and Pedro Pablo Gómez, there was an old market there. What caught my attention was the abundance of food and fruit. I came from a country where there was a great lack, intellectually, when it came to freedom of expression, which had a great impact on me and started my love for Ecuador,” the reporter recalls.

“I always ask the celebrities that I have the opportunity to interview here, I always ask them to say hello to Ecuador, I always ask them about the experiences they had in Ecuador, its gastronomy, its places, its environment and if I can catch the attention of all of them, from Myke Towers, from Ronaldinho, from Shakira, I haven’t had the chance to interview her yet, but I was close to her”, he mentions.

Career in Ecuador

Working in front of the cameras has been an activity he has been engaged in since he was 22 years old. It was part of the Celebrity Detective program, with Sharon La Hechicera at the helm of this production. He was also a member of the reporter team for We go with everything, by the ear, from house to house, La Sazón de Mariaca, Activities he alternated with contracts where he was master of ceremonies, pageant director and singer for private parties.

“My career started with Famous Detectives, people started liking me, with my different style, I tried to add my own spin, my flavor to my work, and people liked that badge. I miss that, I miss walking into a place and people say: here’s Leonel. I miss the affection of the public and their recognition a lot,” he admits.

The desire to earn more when he was in the last productions and the high demand for coverage, he explains, were the trigger for him to quit the television stage.

United States, New Opportunities

Migrating to the United States had one goal: to find a job in any field and earn an income. “I wanted to do anything, I kept thinking about the problem of social networks. I arrived here in the United States and even when I was in Ecuador, I was disappointed with television, I didn’t want to do entertainment anymore, I didn’t want to do shows anymore, I took it as a distraction, because I felt that television had given so much of my life and I was not reciprocated by television. That’s how I started giving interviews on the street,” says the journalist via Zoom of this newspaper.

His memorable stamp when making faranduleras notes made his followers start asking about him. Before he decided to pursue journalism, he worked in construction and drove races like Uber. “I’ve been working for Teleamazonas for about a month or two, I send my content to En Cort, I’ve always liked their style, and once I knocked on the door of Teleamazonas, in my beginnings, to work there and even though I wasn’t there at the time. The door has opened, the opportunity has been provided now, since it is already far away,” he says.

Allegues started making content for his social networks, and after the video he posted on his network about the death of his former partner Miguel Cedeño (La Cerecita), he realized that he had to return to his profession.

“I uploaded it and it started going viral, it was like a call that I had to rededicate myself to this thing. I’m going to cover Billboard, I started making contacts, I took my phone, my wireless microphones, I went to the cover and that’s where this journey started about 7 or 8 months ago. There I caught Maluma, Nicky Jam, Ivy Queen, Grupo Firme and sent it all to TC Televisión. I became a TC correspondent. The program De Boca en boca is broadcast, and Teleamazonas sees that I am still doing content and that I entered the wedding of Marco Anthony. They contact me through my networks and tell me they want that content,” he says in detail.

It was this international coverage that contributed to the ease with which he could meet stars in that city, which motivated the Cuban to become a correspondent.

“It sounds easy, but it’s also complicated. They are always with their security teams, but I get close and manage to get a lot of stuff out. A product of independent work, I sell my content to Teleamazonas, but also Al Rojo Vivo, Univisión and also Telemundo, specifically two interviews, that of rapper 6ix9ine and Anuel. It worked out really well for me,” says Allegues, who also reported on Spanish soccer player Gerardo Piqué’s arrival in Miami to reunite with his children.

Alejandra Jaramillo and Catalina Mora punished in ‘Sit who can’: Two Ecuadorian women left without a chair

“I feel very happy because my videos have gone viral. It’s nice that you do your job, that people recognize you and that they still pay you well for it. At the moment I really like my lifestyle, I don’t have a boss, I push myself, I do my reports, I make contacts, when the paparazzi betray, for example, Ronaldinho, on his birthday I waited for him in front of the disco and that was born in me, and before that all that energy was given to the channels, but now I give it to myself, and I like it, although I have to say that I would really like to see the possibility of returning to Ecuador and the opportunity to be at the head of a program, with an entertaining character, and have the opportunity to succeed there,” emphasizes Allegues, who this year plans to return to the country.

‘Influencer’ Beta Mejía answers if she is in a relationship with Alejandro Jaramillo

Because he, who viralized the video featuring Esmeralda Alejandra Jaramillo and Beta Mejía, is also responsible for the subsequent video in which he asks Mejía whether or not he has a relationship with an Ecuadorian woman, a situation he denied while hosting whoever can sit He was in the background of the frame, with his back turned, during a sports competition.

Allegues is not currently in a romantic relationship and assures that he is focused on strengthening his presence on the networks. “I want to have my own platform for digital entertainment, where we do interviews, paparazzi, I have achieved many exclusives, I want to settle in this digital world, that’s where I’m aiming, I want to have my own medium and be an important means of communication,” he says. (AND)