Íæż½ã½ã

Political situation is stable with no changes anticipated for next 5-10 years. Impact of politics on expats is principally financial with high taxes on imported items (to limit USD leaving the country) making cars, imported grocery items, liquor more expensive than North America.
Correa is a socialist. IMO, he has been a positive for the large percentage of the population that is very poor. However his hatred for the USA (and support of all things Chavez) has led him to take economic positions that hurt the local economy and limit foreign investment. He is also very sensitive/immature incapable of accepting criticism leading to closing of newspapers and TV stations and restricting free speech. Fortunately, Ecuadorians tend to be passive and willing to put up with abuses most expats would never accept.
My most immediate concern is a need to exit the USD which would diminish the value of money in local banks when converted  to local currency, create high local inflation, force expats to learn how to economically survive  in a high inflation country (ask an Argentinian or Brazilian for pointers) and a continued increase in tax on imported items.

There is a recent article from WSJ on Corra.  The person writing it is a conservative columnist who thinks Ecuador is turning into Venezuela.  I am not convinced.

Unless you are a paid member of the English WSJ site, you need to pull up the article by way of a Google search. Enter these keywords and it should be the first item listed:

MARY ANASTASIA O'GRADY correa wsj

Or if you read Spanish, there is a direct link since the articles are free:

Nards, time will tell if Ecuador turns into Venezuela as Chavez had an eight year head start to manage VenezuelaÂ’s economy. However, the trends are similar with initially changing the constitution to eliminate criticism from TV, newspapers and political opponents. A more insightful WSJ article earlier this year noted the economies doing the worse in Latin America were those where the government sought to actively manage their economies including Venezuela and Ecuador.

Here is a article that was posted yesterday in WSJ, just click the title -->

Another from Reuters today on Correa:

Some more news.

A good interview by RT (Video)


Reuters Canada


Washington Post


Miami Herald

What effect, if any, do you all think the death of Hugo Chavez will have on Ecuador's political direction?

Palmtree:

Ecuador is a very, free, open and democratic country filled with
great people who are working diligently to keep it that way.

JIM SKALSKI, Guayquil