Ecuadorian presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio was forced to cancel a face-to-face interview with a Colombian cable television news network a week before he was assassinated.
The 59-year-old Villavicencio had scheduled a meeting with NTN24 program director Ruth Del Salto on Aug. 1 in Guayaquil, Ecuador, the network revealed Wednesday, just hours after he was shot after leaving a campaign event at a school in the capital Quito.
Nine people, including a candidate for the National Assembly and two police officers, were injured, Ecuador’s attorney general said in a statement.
At least seven people were arrested, including a gunman who was shot by police and then died in an ambulance that rushed him to a local medical facility.
NTN24 said Villavicencio chose to conduct a virtual interview with Del Salto.
The Ecuadorian presidential candidate was killed Wednesday shortly after he walked away from a campaign event in a school gymnasium in Quito, Ecuador.
Villavicencio appeared in a virtual interview with Colombian television news network NTN24 on August 1 after being advised to cancel the face-to-face meeting with Ruth Del Salto, the channel’s program director.
The right-wing politician and former journalist said the threats came from the Sinaloa Cartel, the notorious Mexican criminal organization founded by imprisoned drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, and one of his key associates in Ecuador, José “Fito” . Macías, the imprisoned boss of the Los Choneros gang.
Villavicencio, a married father of five, said the threats were the by-product of a campaign pledge to take down criminal organizations linked to political figures.
“What these threats from the Sinaloa Cartel are doing is demonstrating that our government program is one whose very purpose is to break down and dismantle these criminal drug trafficking structures in collusion with political actors, and this is perhaps most important,” said he. said.
As one of eight candidates for president, Villavicencio stressed that Ecuador no longer needs to fear criminal organizations.
“They pretend to have a country on their knees, as they already did in Colombia, as they did and are doing in Mexico,” he said. “A brave president must arm himself with the courage of his people and the criminals, tell these gangs of hitmen, drug traffickers and members of criminal structures that they will not win.”
Villavicencio said last week that he and his team had been threatened by a drug ring. He will be photographed at the rally on Wednesday
A woman was found to have been seriously injured in the shooting and was carried back inside
Villavicencio, a candidate of the Build Ecuador movement, added that the results of the August 20 election — which will take place on Thursday on the scheduled date, according to a government statement — would show “either the homeland triumphs or the mafia triumphs.”
‘Here I show my face. I’m not afraid of them,” he said in a statement before his death, calling Macías by his alias “Fito.”
Villavicencio was a former member of Ecuador’s National Assembly before it was dissolved in May and stood at 7.5 percent.
His campaign adviser, Patricio Zuquilanda, told The Associated Press that he had received at least three death threats prior to the attack and that reports had been filed with authorities. One arrest has been made.
José ‘El Fito’ Macías is one of the leaders of the Ecuador-based Los Choneros gang, a gang associated with the Sinaloa Cartel
Ecuador’s president tweeted a photo of their emergency meeting on Wednesday night
People take cover as gunshots were fired after a political rally in Quito on Wednesday
The father of five was known as a thorn in the side of corrupt companies and politicians
Zuquilanda made a plea to international authorities, calling on them to take a stand against the wave of violence and drug trafficking in the South American country.
“The Ecuadorian people are crying and Ecuador is mortally wounded,” he said. “Politics cannot lead to the death of a member of society.”
Villavicencio was one of the most critical voices against corruption, especially during the administration of former President Rafael Correa from 2007 to 2017, and was sentenced to 18 months in prison for libel for statements made against the former president.
He fled to indigenous areas in Ecuador and was later granted asylum in Peru.
As a lawmaker, Villavicencio was criticized by opposition politicians for obstructing an impeachment trial against President Guillermo Lasso this year, leading to the latter calling an early election.
Lasso, who was at risk of impeachment when he dissolved the National Assembly and called elections, said in late May that he would not run for re-election.
The legislature had considered Lasso’s impeachment over allegations that he had ignored warnings of embezzlement regarding a contract with the state-owned oil transportation company Flota Petrolera Ecuatoriana (FLOPEC).
Lasso, who was at the premiere of the Sound of Freedom movie when he learned of Villavicencio’s murder and was hurriedly brought out, said the murder will not go unpunished.
“For his memory and his struggle, I assure you this crime will not go unpunished,” Lasso tweeted.