Ecuadorians Abroad To Vote in Person

On Monday night, the National Electoral Council (CNE) decided to allow Ecuadorians residing abroad to vote in person in the second round of the presidential elections to be held on Oct. 15.

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This happens after the massive complaints about the failures of the electronic system that prevented thousands of Ecuadorians from voting in the first round held on Aug. 20.

“I am voting in favor of reforming the regulations for the 2023 early presidential and legislative elections and thus implementing face-to-face voting in three constituencies abroad,” CNE President Diana Atamaint said.

When explaining this decision, she said that the CNE provision "is not due to any proposal from any political party" but that it seeks to guarantee migrant's political rights and comply with the Constitution and the Code of Democracy.

Atamaint also pointed out that the malfunction of the online voting system provided by the company AntroProyectos will be brought to the attention of the State Comptroller General and the Prosecutor's Office if necessary.

On August 25, the CNE decided to repeat the vote for legislators in the three constituencies abroad due to problems with the online voting system.

Only 51,643 out of 123,854 Ecuadorians residing abroad were able to vote effectively in the elections in which Luisa Gonzalez and Daniel Noboa were finalists to contest the presidency.

Besides requesting an exhaustive investigation into what happened, the leftist Citizen Revolution (RC) party called for the repetition of the votes abroad.

The CNE justified what happened arguing cyber attacks on the voting system from countries such as India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Russia, Ukraine, Indonesia, and China.