Family sagas seek their space in local politics

Ecuadornews:

Everything stays within family. Father and son, husband and wife, and even brothers. The impossibility of some sectional authorities to re-elect themselves in office has pushed them to look for candidates for successors, not between the leadership and bases of their political organizations, but within their families.

The first of a series of cases is confirmed today with the proclamation of the candidacy of Juan José Yúnez for the Mayor of Samborondón, a position held today by his father, José Yúnez, and that he will have to deliver after 23 consecutive years of management. With the official announcement, in the Sports Coliseum ‘Humberto Andrade’ of the cantonal capital, the Social Christian Party closes the list of candidates for mayorships in the 25 cantons of the province of Guayas. However, the case of the Yúnez is not the only one.

To the south of this canton, in Yaguachi, the mayor Daniel Avecilla aspires to be the one who hands over the post, after two periods, to his wife, Esther Castro, as reported by EXPRESO in its edition of September 17 last. And further north, in Balzar, Mayor Cirilo Gonzales confirmed to this newspaper in a past interview that his wife, Martha Burgos, or his son and current deputy mayor, Emilio Gonzales, would aspire to succeed him in the post in the March 24 elections. But this is not a phenomenon typical of Guayas, it happens in other provinces (see graphic).

This is how the political clans are formed and in the current history there are some like the Zambrano in Manabí; the Cisneros, in Santa Elena; los Sánchez and Falquez in El Oro; the Bucaram with national scope and preponderance in the province of Guayas.

Marcelo Espinel, project director of the Citizenship and Development Foundation, believes that this exercise is a reflection of the structures that govern most of the country’s political organizations. “This ends up affecting democracy, because the representatives are not those who in one way or another respond or obey the interests of the party, but what they want is to perpetuate a mayorship and the control of certain elites.”

Part of the fact that this exercise of seeking consanguinity as candidates is something usual is due to the passivity of the bases of political organizations. Being called to question the decision of their leaders, they do not, criticizes Espinel. In addition, he continues, this also reveals that internal democracy processes “do not work”. “They are a fiction of democracy and not what the bases of the party want.”

Ruth Hidalgo, director of the Corporación Participación Ciudadana, considers that these practices are the responsibility of political organizations, of the limited control of the electoral authority and of “the lack of democratic vocation” of the political leaders and their bases, but above all it is a theme with a cultural background. “I blame the culture, the bad practice, the “criollo” liveliness, the lack of ethics of the actors who think they can go overboard and consolidate these practices as a form of patriarchal, family management spaces. That is what must be broken. Against that we must rebel, “he concludes.

Proclamation

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The mayor of Guayaquil and leader of the Social Christian Party, Jaime Nebot, will participate in the event of proclamation of the last candidate of the party to the mayorships of Guayas. Juan José Yúnez assumes today the Christian Social postulation as the first mayor of Samborondón in an event at the Sports Coliseum of the cantonal capital. His father, Mayor José Yúnez will also be present. (I)

Source: https://www.expreso.ec/actualidad/politica-local-familiares-elecciones-seccionales-HG2383779