Ecuador leader proposes lifting ban on foreign military bases [View all]

2 days ago

Vanessa Buschschlüter
BBC News

Ecuador's president, Daniel Noboa, has said he wants to change his country's constitution to allow the presence of foreign military bases. He made the proposal 15 years after the last US soldiers left the base of Manta, on Ecuador's Pacific coast, and returned it to the Ecuadorean military.

President Noboa argues that Ecuador needs foreign military help to fight transnational crime gangs which are using the country as a major transit route for drugs smuggled from South American to Europe and the US.

The 36-year-old leader declared war on the gangs in January, but gang-related violence continues to blight cities such as Manta, Durán and Guayaquil. Noboa made the announcement in a video recorded at the Manta base which was uploaded onto X, formerly known as Twitter.

In it, he criticises the decision taken by then President Rafael Correa in 2008 to not only not renew the accord under which the US had leased the Manta base, but also to enshrine a ban on any foreign military presence in the constitution.

More:
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn0ed8vg5x9o

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Ecuador's citizens protested the presence of US forces at Manta Air Force base for years before a progressive President, Rafael Correa, beat the wealthiest man in Ecuador, Alvaro Noboa, for the election and ended US occupation of that base. He told reporters that of course the US would not agree to Ecuadorean military people operating their own base in the United States, which made perfect sense.

Alvaro Noboa controlled the largest banana industry in Ecuador and has been notorious for gross labor violations, as well as using children to work on his plantations.

With this "smooth" move, his son, who did finally win the Presidency after his father lost 5 separate attempts to become elected, has demolished the progress Ecuador's successful President Correa made. Correa was fought viciously every day of his presidency by the Ecuadorean hard right in Guayaquil, of which his brother was a major player, and clearly Washington was able to grab Ecuador's air base back from Ecuador's legitimate control.

Loathsome turn of events. Obviously the protests will be renewed because the population has steadfastly rejected US military presence there from the first.