Crisis on Air Force Promotions

The Air Force uprising that took the airport Lane of Quito on September 30 matched the process of promotions for the officials and the air technicians during the 90 years of the institution, celebration that will take place on October 27.

Leonardo Barreiro, commander of FAE is on top of the list to be promoted to lieutenant general, only if the Council of Generals of FF.AA qualifies him. The residence of Barreiro on the institution depends of Army Chairman, Ernesto González, the Marine commander Aland Molestina, and the Army commander Patricio Cárdenas. However if he is not promoted he will be out of the institution and Ministry of National Defense Javier Ponce will have to designate a list of candidates for the President.

Ponce added that in these days the decision of the Council of Generals regarding Barreiro would decide the future of the force. So far coronels William Orellana, Cesar Ramos, Cesar Merizalde, Luis Rivera, Fabian Palacios are qualified to occupy Barreiro’s place. If the current leader of the Air Force remains in the institution he would be part of the Council of the 12 Generals of FAE, which has around five thousand people.

Yesterday the discipline council sanctioned the officers responsible for the uprising on September 30, in the section “Ala 11”. The communication was made by Antonio Puga who gave mayor Dick Torres a list of 250 names of the officers involved.

President Rafael Correa expressed his contempt on the intelligence service since he knows that they didn’t count with many resources and that their directors were chosen by foreign embassies. Based on this he did not acknowledged the lack of information of the police according to the secretary of Intelligence, Francisco Jijón.

President Correa didn’t ruled out the advice of Chile Government on the rebuilding of the National Police due to their good experience with the police, stating that most of the police backup the government.