They research you, analyze you and tell you what you want to hear. That message that may sound like music to your ears may just be a scam. Created to reach you and convince you.

The election campaign is progressing and I imagine the political consultants and their teams discussing with the candidates the messages they will convey to the voters in order to win their votes.

The campaign will be short, so there is no time to waste. You have to go in with everything, no matter how.

Ecuadorians’ current concerns are basically focused on two issues. A recent survey conducted in Guayas, Manabí, Pichincha and Azuay by the polling company Click Research, among citizens over 18 years of age, reveals, above all, security as the biggest concern that Ecuadorians have. Next is the issue of unemployment.

The research is a mirror of what we Ecuadorians are suffering. In 2022, the number of intentional homicides reached 4,603. Ecuador is the sixth most violent country in the region, after Mexico.

In 2023, crimes are on the rise. The daily average is 17.4 murders, so if the trend continues, we could end the year with more than 6,300 cases.

The opinion of the citizens, who are already in power many times have no value, in sui generis election campaigns like the one we are currently experiencing in Ecuador, assumes exceptional importance.

Let’s not allow more hate speech in a violent country.

Faced with the security crisis we are experiencing, warmongering discourses to fight against it are getting stronger. People, sometimes rightly, look for bullets to defend them from criminals.

For the candidates, winning the elections is their battle; For voters, the country’s recovery from the drug mafia is a matter of life and death. In this war, it is important that we Ecuadorians understand that it is not solved by a branding slogan, but by a deep analysis of the situation and the causes that brought us to where we are.

Let’s save the country from the hands of dirty war strategists who are trying to impose their story on us in order to win the trust of the people and fight for the presidential chair.

Let’s ask those who offer us miracles what they think about democracy, the role of the armed forces, the police, the use of weapons, freedom of expression, individual rights, among other key issues.

Their answers to these questions are important, even more so at a time when the same surveys reveal the majority rejection of consulted citizens in these provinces towards the National Assembly, the judiciary, the media, politicians, indigenous leaders and businessmen.

Let’s demand answers at the level of leaders, not adventurers who use pictures and stories of pain to sell their proposal and buy their vote.

Let’s not allow more hate speech in a violent country. (OR)