Supporters of Ecuador's President Daniel Noboa gather outside National Electoral Council (CNE) building, in Quito, Ecuador, on April 13, 2025. Photo: Daniel Becerril/Reuters.
Ecuador’s 2025 presidential election, which ended with a clear victory for Daniel Noboa by 11.3 points, presents unusual data that has caught the attention of electoral analysts and academics in the region. This is the warning issued by Professor Francisco Rodríguez, an expert in public and international affairs at the University of Denver, in a comparative analysis of runoff election results in Latin America.
Francisco Rodríguez, who holds the Rice Family Chair at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies and is the author of The Collapse of Venezuela, highlights that the increase in votes for Noboa between the first and second rounds is equivalent to 110.4% of the votes obtained by third-party candidates, double the regional average of 54.8%.
“Ecuador’s case stands out as a clear outlier in the region,” the academic notes. “The magnitude of the increase in votes has no similar precedents, except in Haiti in 2010/2011, an election highly contested due to possible fraud.”
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Unlike other elections, where the increase in voter turnout in the second round was driven by known factors (such as in Peru in 2016, with the anti-Fujimorist movement that benefited Pedro Pablo Kuczynski), in Ecuador, both pre-election and exit polls predicted a close race, which was not reflected in the final results.
The analysis also rules out explanations such as a low percentage of third-party votes or an unusual increase in turnout in the second round. “The data do not support these hypotheses. Voter turnout did not deviate significantly from the regional norm,” Rodríguez clarifies.
The author emphasizes that statistical anomalies should be subject to scrutiny. “The irregularities do not, in themselves, prove the existence of an improper act, but they do justify a serious investigation to understand what happened,” he maintains.
Among the possible explanations that have circulated in the country are alleged massive vote-buying operations and the intensive use of emergency decrees in the run-up to the elections. “These are hypotheses that must be rigorously evaluated,” he concludes.
The result of the Ecuadorian election, he warns, “should not be treated as just another case of Latin American electoral behavior. It is a deviation that merits attention from all who value the integrity of democratic processes.”
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
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