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Correa wins right to rewrite charter

Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa waves at supporters after casting his vote in a constitutional reform referendum in Quito on Sunday. PHOTO: AFP

Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa celebrated victory yesterday after voters apparently approved his plan to rewrite the country's Constitution by a larger than three to one margin.

According to unofficial national exit polls, 78.1 percent of voters, in a national referendum held on Sunday, backed his plan for convening an assembly to draft a new constitution.

Early official returns from less than 10 percent of voting districts indicated the president's proposal had the support of 84.1 percent of Ecuadorans.

"For the government's part, we will always respond with more democracy, as we have done this Sunday," the president said at a news conference in the southwestern port of Guayaquil.

The leftist economist's remark appeared aimed at deflecting criticism that he wants to take Ecuador down the path of his ally, Venezuela's firebrand socialist president, Hugo Chavez.

The widely popular Correa, 44, had threatened to quit if voters had rejected his plan to remake the Constitution, which he wants to use to tighten state control of the economy, particularly in the oil and financial sectors.

About 11.5 percent of voters opposed the plan, while 7.1 percent of the ballots were invalid and 3.3 percent were blank, according to the Cedatos-Gallup poll of 40,000 voters.

The survey had a margin of error of two percentage points and the private company's results were broadcast by the television network Ecuavisa.

If, as expected, the victory is confirmed, Ecuadorans would be called to elect a 130-seat Constituent Assembly between October and November, which would be tasked with the writing of a new constitution.

The text would be submitted to a national referendum next year.

Correa said that Sunday's approval at the polls was not "a victory of a single man, but of the country," one of the poorest and most unstable in South America.

He rejected the notion of an "imposition of a foreign model," as suggested by opponents critical of his alliance with Chavez.

An assembly of elected Chavez supporters rewrote Venezuela's constitution in 1999.

"Never will we allow the imposition of a foreign model. As we say, the Ecuadoran people have learned to have confidence in ourselves," he told reporters.

Correa, speaking at the news conference, said he would expel the World Bank's representative in Quito, accusing him of withdrawing funds in retaliation for the government's oil sector reforms.

He said the World Bank official had tried to blackmail him when he was economy minister in 2005 with a loan of US$100 million.

"We will expel the World Bank representative from the country because we are not going to take a bribe from anyone," Correa said, without naming the official.

The bank's current representative in Ecuador is Eduardo Somensato.

Correa has set out a sweeping reform program for his five-year mandate that would include reversing free-market measures, renegotiating foreign oil contracts and cutting ties with the International Monetary Fund.

The opposition, conceding defeat in the referendum, warned that Correa's plan threatens democracy and the economy.

"The Ecuadoran economy will be pigeonholed by all the organizations as the worst bet in Latin America.

As for democracy, there is not doubt it is in grave danger," said Osvaldo Hurtado, former president in 1981-1984 and head of the Christian Democratic Union.
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