In the two years since Guillermo Lasso, millionaire and conservative banker, won the presidency in Ecuador, the region has changed dramatically. Leftist leaders have won election after election, including in neighboring Colombia, which had been the United States’ main strategic ally in the hemisphere for decades. This far-reaching geopolitical shift to the left has made the US-Ecuador relationship of utmost importance to Washington — as well as Quito.
Several senior US officials have visited Ecuador, and Lasso himself was warmly welcomed to the White House in December. On the eve of this visit, the US Congress passed the United States-Ecuador Partnership Act, which aims to further strengthen bilateral relations.
“Ecuador has become a model in Latin America and the Caribbean for its continued efforts to strengthen democratic governance and human rights,” said Senator Bob Menendez, who co-sponsored the project, at the time. of law.
But the situation on the ground tells a different story.
In recent years, Ecuador has suffered a sharp decline in most development and public welfare measures and has fallen back into anarchy. Poverty and inequality have increased after years of steady improvement, while the country’s security situation has deteriorated significantly.
Ecuador’s homicide rate fell from 5.8 homicides per 100,000 population in 2017 – one of the lowest rates in the Western Hemisphere – to 25.5 in 2022. To date, two Ecuadorian cities are considered the deadliest in the world.
Ecuador has also reached appallingly high levels of violence in prisons. Eleven large-scale gang-related massacres in the country’s prison system, with 416 inmates brutally murdered since February 2021, have shocked the country and the region.
Drug cartels have also infiltrated the police and military. In December 2021, Michael Fitzpatrick, the US Ambassador to Ecuador, publicly denounced the country’s “narco generals”, although this did little to dampen enthusiasm in Washington for the new administration.
Due to this deteriorating situation, Lasso has become extremely unpopular. In the most recent polls, his approval rating ranged between 12 and 14 percent.
In February, the main opposition party won all major local elections in Ecuador, including municipal elections in Quito and Guayaquil, Ecuador’s two largest cities, and now also holds provincial governorships. the largest, where about 70% of the population resides. .
In the same elections, Ecuadorians voted on eight referendum issues, all promoted by Lasso, including changes to the constitution. Voters rejected all of his proposed reforms.
In recent weeks, several corruption scandals have dealt another blow to the beleaguered Ecuadorian president. Lasso’s brother-in-law, Danilo Carrera, is under investigation for a large-scale corruption scheme of forged contracts in the energy sector.
The Attorney General has also opened an investigation into the alleged links between one of Carrera’s close collaborators and an Albanian drug trafficking network and the attempt by the Lasso government to close an investigation into this organized criminal network.
The president’s brother-in-law has also long been suspected of having hidden assets in the United States, including assets in Florida. Lasso himself was accused, before his election in 2021, of overseeing a complex network of offshore companies in jurisdictions that would have allowed him to avoid taxes. It also features prominently in the Pandora Papers.
Since 2017, it has been an impenetrable offense for Ecuadorian public officials to hold assets in tax havens. Despite potentially violating that ban, Lasso has managed to stay in office — and on White House visitor records.
The Ecuadorian president has dismissed the corruption charges. Carrera also denied any wrongdoing and took legal action against a journalist, who reported on the scandal.
Lasso has also sought to publicly intimidate journalists investigating corruption allegations, calling them “media terrorists”, “media entertainment mercenaries” and “spoiled brats”. [who] must be stopped instantly”. The media watchdog Reporters Without Borders condemned his “violent diatribes” against the press.
When summoned by the Ecuadorian National Assembly, Lasso refused to attend legislative hearings to present his version of events.
The day after the prosecutor issued a search warrant at the presidential palace as part of an investigation into corruption, the government dismissed the police investigators in charge of the case, a measure denounced by the Assembly National Court and the National Court of Justice.
Yet, so far, the Lasso government has received nothing but praise from US officials. “We admire the strong voice for democracy that you have shared with the people of Ecuador, but also with the peoples of our entire hemisphere,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said during his visit to Ecuador in October this year. last. “You and I are united not only in our values but also in our vision for the future, which is both free and democratic,” President Joe Biden said after meeting the Ecuadorian president in December.
All of this was duly accompanied by praise from the American foreign policy establishment, Eric Farnsworth, the Vice President of the Council of the Americas, calling on the United States to unequivocally help Ecuador de Lasso, a “strong democracy in a troubled neighborhood.
The call was heard by Republican Senator Marco Rubio who, undeterred by the proliferation of corruption allegations, traveled to Ecuador in late February to show his support for Lasso’s beleaguered government.
But the truth is that, under Lasso, Ecuador has retreated. Institutions and the rule of law crumbled and corruption flourished and penetrated Lasso’s inner circle. In light of these troubling developments, the Biden administration should maintain its commitment to fighting corruption, even when it is a perceived ally.
She is expected to speak out against Lasso’s attacks on the media and his attempts to intervene in investigations into the alleged wrongdoings of his close associates. The US Department of Justice and Treasury should investigate allegations that Lasso, his brother-in-law and various other associates hold assets in US jurisdictions.
If the United States continues to blindly support the Ecuadorian president, it runs the risk of being seen as a catalyst for corruption and authoritarianism by Ecuadorians and others in the region. And as the crisis in the country deepens, Washington could find itself on the wrong side of history.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Al Jazeera.
