82 pc support new referendum in Ecuador

[Robbien]

Source: Qatar Agencies

QUITO, Ecuador • An overwhelming majority of Ecuadoreans supported President Rafael Correa’s push for a special assembly to rewrite the constitution, final results from a nationwide referendum showed on Friday.

Jorge Acosta, president of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, said 81.7 per cent of Ecuadoreans voted in favor of the assembly in Sunday’s referendum. About 12 per cent voted against it and nearly 6 per cent cast spoiled or blank ballots. The electoral court will now set a date to elect 130 assembly members, who will meet for 180 days to draw up a new charter.

Correa, a US-trained economist and ally of left-wing firebrand President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, proposes a new constitution to wrest power from political elites and the country’s unpopular Congress.

Correa, the country’s eighth president in a decade, has said that a new constitution is necessary to limit the power of the country’s discredited parties, which he blames for the Andean nation’s political instability.

Read more: http://www.thepeninsulaqatar.com/Display_news.asp?section=World_News&subsection=Americas&month=April2007&file=World_News2007042215149.xml

[papau]

1. Great - current Consitutions in most places are about the rights of the rich -not democracy n/t

n/t

[Peace Patriot]

2. Also putrid corruption. Think of Bushites running things for three decades.

Totally looted country, the corrupt thoroughly entrenched, and a very weak executive who gets tossed out on a whim. Much stronger executive needed, and breakup of the highly corrupt, entrenched "congress" (which in reality is not representative at all). That's what this fight was all about, and the good guy, Rafael Correa, is winning--with an astounding 82% of the people behind him.

I can't help but think of parallels here. How the American people would love to have a kickass, antiwar, pro-people president! 75% of the American people opposed to the Iraq war and want it ended, and we can't seem to get anywhere with that goal. Congress now compromising with war criminal Bush on a time-line for withdrawal (according to reports) and giving him $120 billion MORE in unaccountable "emergency" money to ESCALATE the war.

When do WE get what we want?

Correa's name means "belt," and during his campaign he would whip off his belt and comically crack it at the corrupt forces he is pledged to subdue. Think of Sir Lancelot or Sir Percival. That's his ambience. He even looks like a young knight of the Round Table (clear-eyed, square-jawed champion of the poor). Also, during that campaign, when he was asked what he thought about Hugo Chavez's remark to the UN that Bush is "the devil," replied that it was "an insult to the devil." He had been in a tight race with the richest man in Ecuador (a banana magnate) to that point, but, after that, his numbers soared, and he won the presidency with nearly 60% of the vote. (We have to realize that Chavez's remark played to roars of laughter to the south of us.)

When we we get what we want? When we do the hard work that the South Americans have done on TRANSPARENT vote counting. That's when.

[Judi Lynn]

3. This man put his entire job on the line to get this referendum.

The same old filthy oligarchy expected to maintain its chokehold on the country perpetually. They expected to win this knock-down-and-drag-out from the first, as they were willing to pull out all the stops, and stop at nothing.

He's going to need to watch his back for the rest of his term, obviously. He has made some very powerfulf enemies, but the PEOPLE have won.

Wish him god speed in getting the changes ennacted which will benefit the people of his country. His campaign promises were strictly NOT what the _Bush administration wanted to hear, but they were best for Ecuador's population, which has been exploited and used by multinationals to its vast loss. They've been crying out for someone to come forward with THEIR interests close to his/her heart, and for the moment, barring assassination, and sabotage arranged in Washington, they've got one.

[Robbien]

5. When one looks closely enough

there really are brave ones out there who are fighting the good fight.

These are the ones who give me hope.

[Judi Lynn]

4. Ecaudor: 82 Percent Support New Charter

Ecaudor: 82 Percent Support New Charter
Apr 20, 10:51 PM (ET)

QUITO, Ecuador (AP) - An overwhelming majority of Ecuadoreans supported President Rafael Correa's push for a special assembly to rewrite the constitution, final results from a nationwide referendum showed Friday.

Jorge Acosta, president of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, said 81.7 percent of Ecuadoreans voted in favor of the assembly in Sunday's referendum. About 12 percent voted against it and nearly 6 percent cast spoiled or blank ballots.
(snip)

Correa, the country's eighth president in a decade, has said that a new constitution is necessary to limit the power of the country's discredited parties, which he blames for the Andean nation's political instability.
(snip)

Congress, which Correa has labeled "a sewer of corruption," has dismissed three presidents in the last decade, violating impeachment proceedings in the process.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20070421/D8OKNOSO0.html