Ecuadorians will return to the polls this Sunday for a decisive presidential runoff between the right-wing incumbent Daniel Noboa and leftist challenger Luisa González.

The closely contested race follows a first-round election in February where neither candidate secured the majority, with Noboa receiving 44.17% of the vote and González 44%.

The election unfolds against a backdrop of escalating violence, including by state security forces, rising poverty, power outages and widespread public discontent.

Noboa, son of the richest man in the country, was elected 18 months ago in a special election to serve out what remained of the term of Guillermo Lasso, who called a snap election to avoid a likely impeachment trial on corruption charges.

The current state of the country would seem to leave the incumbent in a tough spot. Foremost on voters’ minds is the explosion of criminal violence: the homicide rate has risen from 5.8 per 100,000 in 2017, the lowest in Latin America, to 39 per 100,000 for 2024, surging dramatically this year.

By historical comparisons, it was a rapid transformation: in eight years, one of the safest countries in Latin America became one of the most violent, with one of the highest murder rates in the region.

Noboa was elected to clean up this mess, but red flags were evident from the start. He was part of a super-rich political class rife with corruption and increasingly connected with organized crime, persecution of political opponents and general degradation of the rule of law. These reinforced each other, making necessary reforms increasingly difficult.

All this was evident in the 2023 election that brought Noboa to power — starting with his legal ineligibility to run for president. Days before the vote, documents revealed that Noboa and his family held sizable assets in Panama. Ecuadorian law bars individuals with holdings in tax havens from holding elected office.

More red flags: large amounts of cocaine have repeatedly been found mixed in with Noboa’s banana shipments; most recently, in March, hundreds of kilos were discovered in boxes belonging to Noboa Trading, majority owned by his offshore company, Lanfranco Holdings.

Then there is Luisa González, a social democrat best known for her role at the highest levels of the administration headed by then-President Rafael Correa. From 2007 to 2017, the period preceding the nation’s recent decline, poverty was reduced by more than 41 percent. Per capita GDP, the most basic economic measure of living standards, grew by 27 percent. The homicide rate dropped from 15.9 per 100,000 to 5.8%.

These and other achievements stand out compared with prior Ecuadorian governments and even more compared to what has followed.

In the eight years since González’s party left office, GDP per person has barely grown and the poverty rate has risen by 30%. Noboa has been in office since November 2023, but there are no signs of progress in resolving the country’s most pressing problems. The first two months of 2025 saw 72% more homicides than the same period in 2024. Kidnappings and extortion have become daily occurrences.

Noboa has, without evidence, repeatedly accused opponents of being “narcos.” This is disturbing amid the unraveling of the rule of law and mounting human rights violations during his brief tenure.

In January 2024, he declared a state of “internal war,” ruling mostly by decree, extending a state of emergency for 240 days and suspending constitutional guarantees. Human rights groups have documented torture and arbitrary detentions.

Noboa, who was one of three heads of government who attended Trump’s inauguration, has alleged that there were “many irregularities” in the first round, without presenting evidence. His claims were contradicted by statements from OAS and EU observers. This raises concerns of a Trump-style “stop the steal” scenario if Noboa loses.

Election observers, governments and international institutions concerned with democracy will need to be vigilant.

Greg Grandin is the Peter V. and C. Vann Woodward Professor of History at Yale University, Pulitzer Prize winner, and author of the forthcoming book, “America, América: A New History of the New World.”

Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. He is the author of Failed: What the ‘Experts’ Got Wrong About the Global Economy (Oxford University Press).