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RUEHLP/AMEMBASSY LA PAZ SEP LIMA 3817
RUEHQT/AMEMBASSY QUITO 0740

C O N F I D E N T I A L GUAYAQUIL 000233 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/25/2018 
TAGS: PGOV EC
SUBJECT: OPPOSITION TO CONSTITUTION STRUGGLES FOR MESSAGE 
AND RELEVANCE 
 
REF:  A. QUITO 616 
      ¶B. QUITO 409 
      ¶C. GUAYAQUIL 158 
      ¶D. QUITO 477 
      ¶E. GUAYAQUIL 202 
      ¶F. QUITO 732 
 
Classified By: Consul General Douglas Griffiths for reason 1.4.(D) 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary.  In the final days of the campaign for 
approval of the draft constitution, the opposition has yet to 
find a coherent or unified theme.  The Catholic Church and 
disparate evangelical Christian pastors have led the most 
visible campaign against the new constitution, claiming that 
it would weaken families and legalize abortion.  In addition, 
Guayaquil mayor Jaime Nebot has campaigned actively against 
the draft constitution.  His enormous popularity in Guayaquil 
and his warnings that the new constitution would erode the 
city,s treasured autonomy and imperil its decade-long 
renaissance mean that the "yes" vote will likely fail to 
carry Ecuador,s largest city.  However neither religious 
leaders nor Mayor Nebot have had much traction in convincing 
the rest of the country to vote against the draft 
constitution.   President Correa has successfully 
outmaneuvered and intimidated the traditional parties and 
political figures, who have largely abstained from the 
campaign.   Most importantly, opponents of the Constitution 
have failed to craft a message that would lead voters to vote 
against the draft constitution.  See Quito's companion piece 
(Septel) on the "yes" vote.   End summary. 
 
Leaders of the "No" 
---------- 
 
¶2. (C) Mayor of Guayaquil Jaime Nebot (PSC), continues to be 
the most visible leader of the "No" campaign.  On September 
8, Nebot announced that if the "Yes" won in the city of 
Guayaquil, he would not run for reelection for mayor.  He 
explained that without a strong opposition mandate from his 
constituents, he would not want constantly to battle the 
central government to receive benefits and resources for the 
city.  President Correa clearly recognizes Nebot as his most 
formidable opponent.  Correa has campaigned weekly in 
Guayaquil, repeatedly attacking what he considers to be 
Nebot,s failure to address the needs of the poor in 
Guayaquil.  Nebot, too, has been in full campaign mode for 
the past month, visiting every neighborhood in Guayaquil, and 
underscoring how the municipality has delivered services 
where the national government has failed.  Nebot told the CG 
that the draft constitution represents a "clear and present 
danger to Guayaquil, its autonomy and the free market system 
in Ecuador."  While he is campaigning aggressively in the 
final week of the campaign, Nebot assured the CG that the 
"Yes" vote would not win in the city of Guayaquil. 
However, Nebot,s popularity does not stretch far outside of 
the city of Guayaquil, especially his emphasis on municipal 
autonomy. 
 
¶3.  (C) Ex president Lucio Gutierrez of the Patriotic Society 
Party (PSP) and his brother, party leader Gilmar Gutierrez, 
have been traveling around the country urging voters to vote 
"No."  They have led the most organized opposition campaign 
on the referendum, with a focus on rural areas where they are 
directly confronting PAIS efforts.  The Gutierrez brothers 
have managed to retain support in rural areas, but the 
President has been aggressively showcasing government public 
work programs in many PSP strongholds.  Correa has also 
directed virulent personal attacks against Lucio Gutierrez, 
indicating that he does not take Gutierrez lightly. 
Speaking to POLCOUNS in the last days of the campaign, Gilmar 
Gutierrez implicitly recognized that PSP was fighting a 
losing battle, saying PSP hoped to reduce the margin of the 
"yes" win.  Center left former Vice President Leon Roldos has 
also been a thorn in the side of government efforts to rally 
support for the Constitution.   Roldos, an ex-Assembly member 
under the Red Etica y Democracia, or RED movement, has filed 
a formal complaint that the referendum is invalid as the text 
of the constitution was changed at the last minute without 
the approval of the Constituent Assembly.  In private 
meetings with us, Roldos has vehemently criticized the 
constitution-drafting process as completely controlled by the 
President and his advisors.  Roldos fears that the draft 
constitution and the transition documents will give the 
President far too much power.  While Roldos is widely 
respected, the rather technical nature of his accusations has 
failed to engage the electorate. 
 
Traditional Political Leaders Invisible 
 
---------- 
 
¶4. (C) Neither of the traditionally strong Coastal parties, 
the Social Christian Party (PSC) and Partido Renovador 
Institucional Accion Nacional (PRIAN), has campaigned against 
the constitution.  The PSC has not even announced a public 
position for or against the document.  PRIAN,s Constituent 
Assembly (CA) members are campaigning against the draft 
constitution, but party leader and ex presidential candidate, 
Alvaro Noboa, has been almost invisible during the campaign. 
In fact, he only returned from his summer holidays in the 
Hamptons on September 11.   Humberto Mata, the feisty leader 
of the Fuerza Ecuador, or Ecuador Strength movement, was a 
fierce critic of President Correa during the campaign for the 
Constituent Assembly.  Mata told the CG that he was sitting 
out the referendum campaign as it was futile to fight against 
the "unlimited power and money of the President."  Cynthia 
Viteri, former presidential candidate for PSC, explained that 
she is now working at a grassroots level, door-to-door to 
explain why one should vote "No".  She has convoked hundreds 
of women in Guayaquil to support the "No" on various issues, 
such as centralism, abortion, health, and gay marriage. 
Viteri said she does not want to be publicly recognized as a 
party talking head because any ties to a party at this point 
would be the death knell for the "No" campaign.   PSC leader 
Pascual del Chioppa told the CG that he would not publicly 
comment on the referendum for two reasons.  First, the PSC is 
so discredited that campaigning for the no vote would be a 
"Christmas present for Correa."  Secondly, he said that his 
American business partners had asked him to abstain from 
campaigning. 
 
Limited Funding for "No" campaigns 
---------- 
 
¶5. (C)  Activists who are willing to step forward to campaign 
against the referendum repeatedly complain about the lack of 
funding and the "climate of fear" among the business 
community.  Pacho Harb, PSC Assembly member, and deposed 
member of Congress, told the Consul General that the 
"freedom" wing of Ecuadorian politics (need to explain what 
the "freedom" wing means) was almost dead.  Back in July, 
Harb was making the rounds looking for funding to campaign 
against the Constituent Assembly for what he perceived as an 
attack on liberties in Ecuador.  For one month, Harb funded 
ads in the newspapers and radio decrying the government and 
the new constitution.  Unable to raise additional funds for 
his campaign, Harb abandoned the media effort in August. 
Opposition members of the Constituent Assembly, NGOs and 
student leaders have shared similar complaints that they have 
been unable to raise funds.  A number of them told us that 
they themselves or potential donors have been silenced by 
fear of investigation by local tax authorities (the SRI) 
and/or the fallout from the government,s seizures of the 
Isaias family holdings (Ref A).  Diana Acosta and Rosanna 
Querolo, former assembly members who left President Correa,s 
party Proud and Sovereign Fatherland (PAIS) movement, stated 
that since their departure over ideological differences with 
PAIS, they have both been investigated by SRI for possible 
tax charges.  Jorge Fadul, a PSC assembly member from Machala 
said that two weeks after speaking against the 
sub-contracting issue in the Assembly in February, SRI opened 
an investigation in his company over not declaring $ 275,000 
USD (Ref B).  He noted that the accusation was petty given 
that his company makes $ 25 million USD a year, but that it 
is more the effort of trying to resolve the case that drains 
him of resources.  Another PSC assembly member from Manabi 
province, Leonardo Viteri, said that he too, has been hounded 
by the SRI for value added tax issues in his private medical 
practice.  In late July, Mayor of Machala Carlos Falquez's 
special advisor, Roger Porras, informed Pol/econoff that he 
expected Falquez to be charged with tax evasion by the 
Attorney General as retaliation for their support of the 
"No" (Ref C).   Eduardo Maruri, an Assembly member for the 
center-right UNO movement told the CG that the SRI opened 
investigations on both his advertising agency and the 
Barcelona Soccer Club (Maruri is the current President) the 
day before the election campaign began.  Maria Gloria 
Alarcon, President of the Guayaquil Chamber of Commerce, 
decided to discontinue the Chamber,s "No" campaign after 
the government took over her businesses for links to the 
fugitive Isaias brothers.  Indeed, the director of the Guayas 
Province tax office told the CG last year that he would be 
aggressively pursuing local businesses for failure to comply 
with the complex tax code.  We cannot say whether the SRI 
actions equal intimidation or compliance enforcement efforts 
in a culture where tax evasion is rampant.  However, deep 
pockets in the Coast are feeling the heat, and have been 
 
unwilling to fund the "No" campaign. 
 
Campaign to Vote Null 
---------- 
 
¶6. (C) Likewise, the movement to vote null has failed to gain 
steam.  Proponents of the null vote pitch it as both a 
rejection of the previous corrupt and flawed system, and 
rejection of Correa and the new constitution.  Jimmy Jairala, 
ex-Congressman for the Partido Roldocista Ecuador, or PRE, 
and leading figure of the "Nulo" campaign has told us that 
a "null" vote is essentially a "no" vote, as election rules 
dictate that the Constitution needs a majority of "yes" 
voted to  pass.  He underscored that the only hope for the 
opposition is to split up and offer various reasons for a 
"no" because otherwise Correa will attack them as a whole and 
as a part of the "partidocracia", or old party.  Some members 
of the leftist party, Izquierda Democratica, or ID are also 
supporting the "null" vote.   Diego Monsalve Vintimilla, a 
former ID congress person told Pol/econoff that the ID is 
most concerned about the concentration of executive powers 
and fear what any future presidents may do with these powers 
as outlined in the constitution.  However, the decision to 
support the null vote has deeply divided the party, forcing 
the party congress to step back from its original position 
and allow members to vote however they wished on the 
referendum.   Cuenca, the former ID strong-hold in the 
southern Andes, is expected overwhelmingly to support the 
opposition. 
 
Guayaquil's Central Role in the Opposition 
-------------------------------------------- 
 
¶7. (SBU) Guayaquil continues to be the geographic center of 
the opposition movement.  Following the violent protests at 
Universidad Catolica (Ref E), student movements have 
flourished in support of the "No".  The individual students 
who were signaled out by the Correa government,s public 
service announcements explaining its version of the events 
have joined with other students in a grass-roots effort to 
protest what it believes is the Correa government,s 
increasing authoritarianism and clamping down of freedom of 
expression.  Pol/econoff met with the student leaders, who 
range from 19-22 years old, and are all law students at the 
Universidad Catolica.  Cesar Coronel and Francisco Icaza 
presented a complaint to the Quito office of the Organization 
of American States, but stated it was returned back to them 
for lack of serious proof.  Besides the student movements, 
the church, comprised of the Roman Catholic Church under its 
Episcopal Conference, along with some evangelical leaders, 
have continued to maintain a stance against the referendum 
(Ref F). On September 14, the Catholic Church in Guayaquil 
organized outdoor masses in the street, which convoked more 
than 4000.  While the organizers claimed it was not 
political, this was a clear message of support for the "No." 
 
¶8.   (C) The only two groups visibly campaigning for the "no" 
vote in Ecuador's highlands region are the Christian 
Democrats Union (UDC), led by Diego Ordonez, and the National 
Democratic Agreement, a small NGO under Cesar Montufar. 
Their campaign approach, focusing on balance of powers and 
other issues that concern well-educated elites, and their 
small size, minimizes their impact. 
 
Hard to Fight Against Change 
---------- 
 
¶9.  (C) Comment: The bottom line is the "no" campaign has 
been unable to articulate a message to compete against the 
President,s charismatic call for approval of the referendum. 
 Correa has ably captured the aspirations of the Ecuadorian 
people for a more just and prosperous country.  In many ways 
the referendum is an affirmation of the President,s 
popularity, and desire for change,  rather than an evaluation 
of the merits of the draft constitution.  Religious leaders 
have successfully raised questions among "values voters," 
and Mayor Nebot has rallied his most fervent fans to vote 
against the draft constitution.   Doubts among these groups 
of voters will make the vote close in the city of Guayaquil. 
However, in the rest of the country, the "no" vote looks 
like a step backward to the politics of past.  End Comment 
 
GRIFFITHS