The PSC says that Lasso is the ally of Correismo.

The attacks between members of the Social Christian Party and the government of Guillermo Lasso have been a constant during the first year of the current president’s term. And, once again, this scenario was repeated during an interview that the president had with several editorialists from the newspaper El Expreso.

On June 3, 2022, the editorialist Raúl Noboa asked the president, “Don’t you think it is possible that there will be a boycott to harm your government? Why don’t you make the decision to change it? There are many shortcomings in various ministries and there are Correistas in leadership positions.

Faced with tough questions, Lasso replied, “I don’t see a boycott from the bureaucracy, but from the conspiracy triumvirate. From the first day I’m president they operated and probably won’t stop until I’m gone.”

Lasso was probably referring to the “triumvirate” that he first mentioned in October 2021. In an interview with Carlos Vera, he said that Rafael Correa, former president of the Republic; Jaime Nebot, former mayor of Guayaquil and leader of the Social Christian Party, and Leonidas Iza, president of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (Conaie) “are the three interested in giving an institutional blow to democracy in Ecuador.”

Lasso said that the three want to hit their government, and because they have a majority of votes in the Assembly, they don’t give way to the bills he has presented—in reference to the Creating Opportunities Project.

On this occasion, the president also said that “I have to do everything I have done to prevent the Prosecutor’s Office, the Comptroller’s Office and more from being taken away.”

But the comment that caused social networks to go crazy came at the end of his response when he said, “I think Camilo Ponce, Sixto Durán Ballén and León Febres-Cordero would be outraged seeing who is the ally of the Social Christian Party (PSC) now”— in reference to the alleged pact they have with correismo and that caused the departure of Guadalupe Llori from the presidency of the National Assembly.

Two days later, on June 5th, the Social Christian Party responded to Lasso’s comment through a statement on its social networks.

The headline of the statement made it very clear what would be said in the document:

President Lasso: stop lying.

In the first lines it says, “Leave now, you are boring and false about the PSC being an ally of Correismo.”

Then, the statement responds to Lasso’s accusation: “León Febres-Cordero would have been outraged at the alliance we had to make with you to take you to the Presidency of the Republic. We did it solely and exclusively to prevent the Correismo candidate from winning the elections.”

In the next paragraph, the Social Christian Party accuses Lasso of being the ally of Correismo and “filing taxes on Ecuadorians, lowering their income and increasing the price of items and services.”

The document ends by stating that “among other things, you are the one who allied with Correismo to grant pardons and amnesties to common criminals, violating the Constitution. As long as you continue to lie, we will continue to deny you.”

Previous confrontations

On April 29, 2022, there was another confrontation between Lasso and the PSC. When Lasso said that “Mr. [Rafael] Correa and Mr. [Jaime] Nebot, these twins together, from the first day of my government, are seeing how they [can] destabilize Ecuadorian democracy.” According to him, former President Rafael Correa and former Mayor of Guayaquil, Jaime Nebot, —two of the most important figures in politics in recent decades— “cannot stand” that he is President.

In the interview, in response to one of the questions from the journalist Ramiro Cueva, Lasso said that the recent crisis and instability within the Assembly “is not a problem of one institution, but of two men who cannot stand that Guillermo Lasso is in the Presidency.” For months, tensions have been building between the government and the Assembly after several bills proposed by Lasso were not addressed or were shelved.

Lasso said that Correa — who is represented in the Assembly by the Union for Hope (UNES) coalition — does so “because he is obviously afraid.” Lasso said that former President Correa was “a fugitive from justice who can’t stand himself even when he sees himself in the mirror.” Correa was sentenced to 8 years in prison for the crime of bribery in the 2012-2016 Bribery case. However, he has not served the sentence because he has been abroad since 2017.

“The other one,” Lasso said about Nebot, “hates me because he didn’t have the balls to be a candidate and now that he stayed at home, he has an envy and jealousy that spends all day craning how I destabilize democracy Ecuadorian.” Nebot is the leader of the Christian Social Party (PSC) which has 14 assembly members in the Legislature.

Jaime Nebot (PSC) and Guillermo Lasso (CREO) were allies during the 2021 presidential elections. However, days before the President took office, the Social Christian Party announced that the alliance had been broken.

The alliance existed to support the one presidential candidate the two groups believed could beat correismo candidate Andrés Arauz: Guillermo Lasso.

However, as soon as the National Assembly was sworn in, the alliance was broken after an alleged non-compliance by CREO which, according to Nebot, was their failure to support Christian Socialist Henry Kronfle to preside over the National Assembly.