As I said in interviews this week, last Sunday we witnessed an unprecedented day in the country’s electoral history.

Daniel Noboa’s candidacy was very well thought out. A fresh image of a smart businessman, with an academic degree and experience in the private sphere. But whoever tells me that until the day of the debate he had even the slightest expectation that he would sneak into the second round, he is lying.

I hear a general comment that attributes its brutal rise to the second round only to debate and good campaigning. I do not agree with that opinion at all.

Nobo’s arrival in the second round corresponds to a kind of “planetary alignment” that rarely happens. Here are three factors that brought him to the edge of Carondelet:

First of all, the fierce attack of Jan Topić, who until then appeared as an opponent of Correísmo, received from various parts of the country: from candidates who demanded a reduction of their votes; from political actors who, although they did not participate in the elections, were very interested in Topić and his main ally JRZ not coming to power; and from the intellectual, media and business elites who believed that by attacking him, their favorite would rise (which never did).

Secondly, to a respectable campaign in the territory and networks and the memory of his father, positioned throughout the country, with a good presentation in the debate that put him for the first time in the window of many undecideds who did not like any of the star candidates (neither those who certainly led, nor those who led in fake polls) and who saw in Noboa the perfect candidate: young, intelligent, purposeful and with practices far from traditional destructive politics, which was possible basically because since he is far from any possibility of entering the second round no one attacked him therefore he didn’t even have to attack anyone.

And, thirdly, as a consequence of the damage done to Topić and Noboa’s growth of undecided numbers, he began to receive Topić’s dissidents and, in addition, a useful voice that eventually left Otto, Yaku and Hervas.

(…) Those who are already adding and subtracting votes, I remind you that the second round starts from scratch.

In the case of Luisa, she withstood very well the attacks received throughout the campaign (besides the shower of death of Fernando Villavicencio, a phenomenon that deserves a special analysis), since the correísta hard vote was present and strong.

As for the new convocation of the National Assembly, the heavy vote consolidated the correista bloc in the Assembly, once again, as the first national force.

And the eternal gravediggers of the PSC will have to sell the tombstone, put away the champagne and drink the sedative, because between their own candidates and allies they would form a bench of 18 (the same number of seats as in 2021), and, furthermore, as it turned out, the configuration of the new Assembly could be the hinge for giving a majority to the next government or the next opposition.

Finally, I remind those who are already adding and subtracting votes that the second round starts from scratch. We will continue to comment. (OR)