But who is Yaku Pérez, the Ecuadorian indgenist leader?
- After the results of the presidential elections held this Sunday in Ecuador are known, a second round will have to be held, since no one has achieved enough votes to hold the presidency.
Andrés Arauzo, considered the candidate of former lehendakari Rafael Correa, has won the general election by obtaining 32.31% of the votes at the moment. The second place has been for the indgenist Yaku Pérez with 19.92% of the votes, the third for the right-wing center Gillerto Lasso with 19.22% and the fourth for the leftist candidate Xavier Hervás. These data were the same when the count was 82%.
There have been no setbacks with Arauze, but there have been setbacks with the engineer Pérez and the candidate from the left, Hervás. The polls put Lasso as the second candidate and Hervás, which would hold 5% of the votes at the ballot box. Now we will have to see who goes to the second round, to compete with Arauze, or Pérez or Lasso, because the number of votes in favour is small and the end of the story can still give surprises.
Yaku Pérez, Indgenist Leader
Yaku Pérez Guartambel is also a lawyer, professor, writer and ruler, and in recent years he has served as prefect of the Ecuadorian department of Azuay. It was the first time an indigenous man was nominated for this post and the main point of his program was the defense of water. It is the biggest surprise of these elections abroad, probably not so much in Ecuador, especially given Pérez's trajectory in recent years.
In No. 247 of Larrun we produced a monograph on Ecuador, in which an interview with Yaku Pérez was held in Ecuador by Juan Gorostidi. This was presented to us by Gorostidi:
“He was head of the ECUARIRA (Confederation of Kitxua Peoples of Ecuador), founded in 1972 since 2013. This organization is part of the CONAIE, which has become the main driver of the mobilizations that took place in Ecuador last October, and which has led the main State leaders to a public negotiation and to the annulment of the decree approved by the Government by order of the International Monetary Fund. This interview was held last August, when Yaku had been in office for four months. In addition to halving her salary, she uses two whole days of the week to talk to any of the groups asking for dialogue. I haven’t found a job to receive me one of these days.”
It has been emphasized for its respect for land and the environment, and in this dialogue it is clear on the subject: “Ours is not a struggle for minority rights. Those who speak of “indigenous” often fall into the racist and colonialist point of view. What we work on is a rooted response to a general emergency."
