CORREA PREDICTS FIRST ROUND VICTORY, NAMES CABINET

C O N F I D E N T I A L QUITO 002455 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/05/2016 TAGS: PGOV PREL EC SUBJECT: CORREA PREDICTS FIRST ROUND VICTORY, NAMES CABINET REF: 05 QUITO 1460 Classified By: PolOff Erik Martini for reasons 1.4 (B&D) ¶1. (C) Summary: Correa's campaign is taking on a triumphalist tone, predicting a first round victory and even naming prospective cabinet members. That tone could cost Correa some support in the first round, when Ecuadorians traditionally like to boost the underdog. Correa's premature cabinet designees and advisors are leftist, heavy on academics and mostly inexperienced. To the extent their views are known, they are consistently anti-American. End Summary. The Correa Show - "Just One Round" -------------- ¶2. (C) Front-running presidential candidate Rafael Correa has become increasingly boastful of victory, using the slogan "Just One Round" as a rallying cry. On October 3, en route to Galapagos, he repeated his claim he would win the elections in the first round. (Note: to win in the first round, Correa would need 51% of valid votes or 40% with a ten point percentage lead over the runner-up.) Correa is polling at 35% of valid votes (i.e. subtracting blank and null votes) and the closest contenders are Leon Roldos and Alvaro Noboa, with 18 to 22% of valid votes in the latest unpublished polls. Clearly emboldened by his rise in polls, Correa publicly revealed future cabinet choices in a press conference on October 3 and in a print interview on the same day. This cable provides background information on those selections, and information about other Correa advisors. Patino For Economy and Finance -------------- ¶3. (U) Ricardo Patino is Correa's top political advisor, currently serving as the National Director for Political Action for Correa's Nuevo Pais movement. He was an adviser, and later Vice Minister, under Correa at the Ministry of Economy, where Correa served as minister for 109 days during the initial part of the Palacio administration. After Correa announced Patino would be his choice in Economy, Social Christian Party leader Leon Febres Cordero released the details of a minor lawsuit pending against Patino for non-payment of condominium fees (totaling $300). ¶4. (U) Patino obtained his undergraduate degree in economics from the Autonomous Metropolitan University of Iztapalapa, Mexico, and his masters in economic development from the International University of Andalucia, Spain. Prior to his stint under Correa, Patino worked as Coordinator of the Technical Advisory Committee to the Inter-ministerial Employment Commission and was an external consultant to the International Labor Organization. He also served on the Economics faculty at the University of Guayaquil. ¶5. (U) Patino, 52, is married to Miriam Alcivar and they have a 20-year-old daughter, Maria Isabel. Patino's brother, Rafael, is affiliated with Leon Roldos' campaign. Alberto Acosta to Energy and Mines -------------- ¶6. (U) Alberto Acosta is not well known and has been described as a "leftist linked to social movements" such as Pachakutik. He is an economist educated at the University of Cologne, Germany and currently a member of the Alternative Ecuador Forum, a group of economics scholars that write against dollarization, the Washington Consensus, multilateral debt and free trade agreements. Acosta also consults for the Latin-American Institute of Social Investigation. Acosta wrote Correa's campaign document, entitled "Truths, Half-Truths and Falsehoods of an FTA," a 24-page diatribe against a U.S./Ecuador free trade agreement. Before FTA negotiations broke down, Acosta was a frequent public debater against an FTA. Jeannette Saltos to Social Welfare -------------- ¶7. (U) Jeannette Saltos is similarly unknown; the Ecuadorian media spells her first and last name wrong in every article. She is an economist and received a masters degree in Community and Regional Planning at the University of Texas at Austin. She is currently the academic administrator of the Ibero-American Network of Ecological Economy at the respected Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO). Previously, she worked as an investigator for the Andean Center for Popular Action and has published papers under the auspices of the Integrated System of Social Indicators of Ecuador on migration issues. Gustavo Larrea to Defense (or Government?) -------------- ¶8. (U) Correa reportedly said he will appoint Gustavo Larrea Minister of Government during the press conference. In a one-on-one interview afterwards, however, Correa reportedly said Larrea would be his preferred Minister of Defense. ¶9. (C) Gustavo Larrea Cabrera is better known in Ecuador's political circles. Known as a leftist politician, he served as a Congressional Deputy for the now-defunct populist left Ecuadorian Popular Revolutionary Action (APRE) party, which aligned with Abdala Bucaram in the 1996 presidential elections. During that time, Larrea was reportedly a protege of Frank Vargas (a notorious ex-general involved in an abortive coup attempt who later kidnapped ex-president Leon Febres-Cordero),and served in Bucaram's ill-fated government as under-secretary of the Ministry of Government under Vargas. He is the Director of the Latin-American Human Rights Association (ALDHU),Ecuador's most visible and polemic human rights group, which has denounced coca fumigations on the Colombian border, among other things. He is outspoken in his opposition to Plan Colombia and the Manta FOL. ¶10. (U) Larrea is 50 years old and a graduate of the Law Faculty of the Catholic University of Andres Bello in Caracas, Venezuela and the School of Sociology of Central University in Quito, Ecuador. He is married and has a daughter. Carlos Pareja Back to PetroEcuador -------------- ¶11. (C) Carlos Pareja, a short-lived former president of PetroEcuador in the Palacio government (ref A),is famous for having pushed for caducity of the Occidental Petroleum contract when he assumed the leadership of PetroEcuador in June 2005. Pareja and Correa resigned together, when Correa rejected questioning by President Palacio in his efforts to deepen economic ties to Venezuela, and Palacio rebuffed Paraja's efforts to terminate the Oxy contract. ¶12. (U) Pareja obtained his chemical engineering degree from the University of Guayaquil. He has held several posts in the GOE, all having to do with the management of oil resources. He now works as an oil industry consultant and advises Correa. Correa's Advisors -------------- ¶13. (C) Fabricio Correa, Rafael's brother, is part of Correa's inner circle of advisors, and handles campaign financing issues. In a recent chance encounter with the Ambassador at a social event, Fabricio chatted amiably and gushed over his 25 cousins, mother and grandfather who all live in the U.S. ¶14. (U) Carlos Vallejo is another political adviser and may be the most experienced politician on Correa's team. Vallejo served as Agriculture Minister during the Hurtado administration (1981-1983) and then as a Popular Democracy Party and PRIAN Congressional Deputy and President of Congress. ¶15. (C) Retired Colonel Jorge Brito has also been cited by press as a Correa advisor on security issues. Brito is one of the colonels involved in the January 21, 2000 toppling of the Mahuad presidency. Brito has since fallen out with fellow coup leader and ex-president Lucio Gutierrez, and initially acted as an advisor to President Palacio. Another military figure reported to be advising Correa, and rumored by some to be Correa's future Defense Minister, General Rene Vargas Pazzos (brother of Frank),has a long leftist family political history and is reported to be a militant of the "Bolivarian Alfarista Movement" with links to Venezuela. Comment: More Lennon than Lenin? -------------- ¶16. (C) With his new slogan "just one round" and press conference to name his cabinet, Correa is becoming even more optimistic. He recognizes the need to keep his momentum going and that his best chance to win the presidency is a first round win. Correa's closest advisors and cabinet "nominees" foretell a very leftist, academic and mostly inexperienced tilt to his administration. Some analysts assert that Correa is a counter-cultural, anti-establishment leftist rather than a militantly ideological leftist, calling him "more Lennon than Lenin." We are not convinced, especially given the background of his advisors. Ecuadorians have come to expect their newly elected populist presidents to turn pragmatic upon election, and therefore they don't take the campaign rhetoric very seriously. This time, perhaps they should. JEWELL