Ecuador's Mano Dura at the Inflection: Noboa's Security Doctrine, Energy Squeeze, and the 2026 Outlook: Deluair Consultancy

Ecuador moved from peripheral cocaine corridor to Pacific epicenter between 2017 and 2023, with the homicide rate climbing from 6 to 47 per 100,000 (Ministerio del Interior). On January 9, 2024, President Daniel Noboa decreed an internal armed conflict and designated 22 organized crime groups as terrorist actors, including Los Choneros, Los Lobos, Los Tiguerones, Lobos, and Latin Kings. The April 2024 referendum delivered a 9 to 2 win on extradition and an 11 year enhanced penalty package. The April 13, 2025 runoff returned Noboa with 55.6 percent against Luisa Gonzalez (Correismo) at 44.4 percent (CNE Ecuador). Homicides receded to roughly 31 per 100,000 in 2024 but remain four times the 2017 baseline. Petroecuador stabilized output near 470 thousand barrels per day, even as the Yasuni-ITT moratorium and Block 16 closure remove 6.5 percent of national production. A drought in late 2024 forced 14 hour blackouts. Mirador and Fruta del Norte anchor the mining response.

From frontier to front line: the January 9 internal armed conflict declaration #

On January 9, 2024, hours after armed members of Los Choneros stormed the live broadcast of TC Television in Guayaquil, President Daniel Noboa signed Executive Decree 111 declaring an internal armed conflict and naming 22 organized crime groups as terrorist non state actors. The list (Los Choneros, Los Lobos, Los Tiguerones, Lobos, Latin Kings, Cubanos, Aguilas, Chone Killers, Cuartel de las Feas, Mafia 18, Mafia Trebol, Patrones, R7, Gangster, Lagartos, Los Fatales, and others) gave the Fuerzas Armadas legal authority to engage under international humanitarian law rather than ordinary policing rules. The decree followed the prison escape of Adolfo Macias, alias Fito, leader of Los Choneros, from La Regional in Guayaquil on January 7.

The geography is inseparable from the cocaine economy. Ecuador sits between Colombia (the largest producer at 2,664 metric tons of pure cocaine in 2023 per UNODC) and Peru, projecting that volume to North America, Europe, and Australia through Pacific maritime routes. Guayaquil's container port (Contecon and DP World Posorja) and Manta became the primary egress points. Cocaine seizures inside Ecuador rose from 110 metric tons in 2020 to 219 metric tons in 2023 (Policia Nacional), with Antwerp and Rotterdam intercepts increasingly traced to Guayaquil bills of lading.

The mano dura doctrine borrows openly from El Salvador. Noboa's team adapted the Bukele model (mass arrest, megaprison, suspended due process windows) to Ecuador's constitutional structure. Bloque de Seguridad combines Policia Nacional and Ejercito under one command. Detentions in state of exception zones rose sharply through 2024 and 2025, and a new high security prison at Santa Elena, modeled on CECOT, broke ground in 2025. The export of the Salvadoran template along the Pacific corridor is now a working hypothesis for Colombian and Peruvian conservative campaigns.

Twin mandates: the April 2024 referendum and the April 2025 runoff #

Noboa first asked voters for a structural mandate. The April 21, 2024 consulta popular put 11 questions on the ballot. The flagship security questions passed by overwhelming margins: extradition of Ecuadorian nationals (Question A) and Fuerzas Armadas support to Policia Nacional inside national territory (Question B), each carrying roughly 65 to 35. Five additional security questions on arms trafficking, asset forfeiture, and prison classifications also passed. Voters rejected the labor flexibility (Question D) and international arbitration (Question E) questions. The electorate endorses hard security but resists market liberalization (CNE Ecuador).

The April 13, 2025 runoff converted that mandate into a full term. Noboa's Accion Democratica Nacional (ADN) defeated Luisa Gonzalez of Movimiento Revolucion Ciudadana (Correismo) 55.6 percent to 44.4 percent on turnout above 83 percent (CNE). The 12 point margin exceeded major polling (Comunicaliza, Click Report), which had projected a race inside 4 points. Gonzalez and former president Rafael Correa alleged fraud, but OAS and EU observation missions certified the count.

Coastal provinces with the highest 2023 homicide rates (Guayas, Los Rios, Manabi, Esmeraldas, El Oro) broke decisively for Noboa, several of them historic Correista strongholds. The sierra split along urban rural lines. Pachakutik, third in the first round, did not formally endorse, and its base appears to have abstained or split. As long as homicide trajectories remain favorable, the political center of gravity stays with mano dura.

Daniel Noboa	Accion Democratica Nacional (ADN)	55.6 percent	Yes (Guayas, Manabi, El Oro, Esmeraldas)	Mixed (Pichincha, Tungurahua)
Luisa Gonzalez	Movimiento Revolucion Ciudadana (Correismo)	44.4 percent	Los Rios partial	Yes (Carchi, Cotopaxi, Bolivar)
Turnout	Voto obligatorio	Approximately 83 percent	n a	n a
Margin	First round to runoff swing	Plus 11.2 points for Noboa	n a	n a

Ecuador 2025 second round presidential runoff, April 13 (CNE final)

The homicide curve: 6 in 2017, 47 in 2023, 31 in 2024 #

The single number that explains Ecuadorian politics is the homicide rate. In 2017 it stood at 6 per 100,000, comparable to Chile. By 2023 it reached 47 per 100,000, the highest in Latin America (Ministerio del Interior). Compounding came from the fragmentation of Los Choneros after the 2020 assassination of Jorge Luis Zambrano (alias Rasquina), which spawned Los Lobos and Los Tiguerones as splinter franchises competing for prison territory and Pacific shipment slots.

The 2024 reversal to roughly 31 per 100,000 represents the steepest one year homicide decline ever recorded in Ecuador (a 34 percent year over year drop, Ministerio del Interior preliminary). The mechanisms are familiar from Salvadoran experience: incarceration of mid level commanders, suspension of intra prison communication, militarization of port perimeter, and shock to inter group coordination. The decline is real but it is not yet a return to baseline. Even at 31 the rate is more than five times the 2017 level. Quito and Cuenca remain comparatively safe (sub 10 per 100,000), while Esmeraldas, Duran, and parts of Guayaquil still register rates above 70.

Sustainability is the open question. Salvadoran compression has held nearly four years, but Ecuador lacks the geographic compactness, prison build out, and constitutional flexibility El Salvador secured under regime de excepcion. If gangs reorganize, or Mexican brokers, Albanian buyers, or Brazilian PCC affiliates push deeper, the curve could re bend upward. Base case: 28 to 35 per 100,000 in 2026, downside 40.

2017	6	Baseline	Esmeraldas (border)	Pre Choneros split, Correa final year
2020	8	Plus 33 percent over 2017	Guayas	Rasquina assassinated, Los Lobos and Los Tiguerones spin out
2022	26	Plus 225 percent over 2020	Guayas, Esmeraldas	Prison massacres, port turf war
2023	47	Plus 81 percent over 2022	Guayas, Los Rios	Villavicencio assassinated, peak fragmentation
2024	31	Minus 34 percent over 2023	Guayas, Esmeraldas	Internal armed conflict declared, mass detentions
2026 forecast	28 to 35	Stable to mild improvement	Coastal corridor	Conditional on prison build out and OCG fragmentation

Ecuador homicide rate per 100,000 (Ministerio del Interior, INEC)

Petroecuador at 470 kbd, the Yasuni-ITT moratorium, and Block 16 #

Petroecuador holds national production close to 470 thousand barrels per day in early 2026, of which roughly 390 thousand barrels per day come from state operated fields and the balance from private contractors. National output is on a decline glide path from 545 thousand barrels per day in 2014, with Sacha and Auca field maturation the dominant driver (Petroecuador operational reports).

The August 2023 referendum on Bloque 43, the Yasuni Ishpingo Tambococha Tiputini (ITT) field, mandated a phased shutdown by August 2024 and removed an asset producing roughly 55 thousand barrels per day inside Yasuni National Park, equal to about 6.5 percent of national production at the moment of the vote. The Constitutional Court has supervised the dismantlement timetable. Petroecuador estimates the foregone revenue at 1.2 billion US dollars per year at 75 dollar Brent and roughly 13.8 billion US dollars in net present value through 2040. The court also ordered the closure of Block 16 (operated previously by Repsol, transferred to Petroecuador in early 2023) inside the Waorani territory, removing an additional 14 thousand barrels per day.

The fiscal mechanics matter for sovereign credit. Ecuador's budget runs on three legs: oil revenue (roughly 24 percent of central government revenue at 75 dollar Brent), VAT (which Noboa raised from 12 to 15 percent in 2024 to plug the post Yasuni gap), and external borrowing. The IMF Extended Fund Facility approved in May 2024 (4 billion US dollar program over 48 months) is conditioned on primary surplus targets that assume the VAT hike holds and that Petroecuador stabilizes around 470 thousand barrels per day net of Yasuni. The 2026 Article IV mission flagged execution risk on the upstream investment plan, which requires roughly 1.4 billion US dollars per year of capex through 2028 simply to offset decline.

Hydropower drought, blackouts, and the mining flagship response #

Ecuador's electricity matrix is roughly 75 to 80 percent hydropower in normal hydrology, anchored by Coca Codo Sinclair (1,500 MW, plagued by chronic erosion and turbine cavitation issues), Paute (Mazar Sopladora and Molino, roughly 1,400 MW combined), Minas San Francisco, and Delsitanisagua. The structural exposure is to the Amazonian basin rainfall pattern. The October 2024 to December 2024 drought pushed reservoir levels at Mazar to historical lows, and CENACE imposed scheduled blackouts that reached 14 hours per day in parts of Quito and Guayaquil during the worst weeks (CENACE daily dispatch reports, Ministerio de Energia).

The crisis exposed three structural deficiencies. First, the lack of base load thermal redundancy after years of underinvestment (the country imported emergency power from Colombia at premium tariffs, and chartered floating barges through 2025). Second, the absence of large scale battery storage. Third, the fragility of Coca Codo Sinclair, whose Chinese built turbines (Sinohydro) have experienced thousands of cracks since commissioning. Noboa's emergency package authorized fast track procurement of 1,200 MW of thermal and renewable capacity, with first units expected to commission in 2026.

Mining is the strategic counterweight. Mirador (CRCC Tongguan, copper) ramped to roughly 65 thousand tonnes of contained copper per year. Fruta del Norte (Lundin Gold) produced approximately 480 thousand ounces of gold in 2024 at 8 to 10 grams per tonne, among the highest grades in operation globally. Combined mining export revenue passed 3.3 billion US dollars in 2024. The pipeline (Cascabel by SolGold and BHP, Loma Larga by Dundee, Curipamba by Adventus and Salazar) could double mining output by 2030 if permitting and community consent hold. The April 2024 referendum did not authorize foreign military bases (Constitution Article 5 prohibits them), but Noboa has reopened conversations with the US Department of Defense on a re deployed Forward Operating Location at Manta naval base, structured as a cooperative use agreement. Manta hosted a US counter narcotics FOL from 1999 to 2009 and is being upgraded under a security cooperation memorandum. A constitutional amendment for permanent basing may be bundled into a 2027 consulta.

The 2026 outlook: stabilization band, structural risks, and three scenarios #

Ecuador in 2026 sits in a fragile stabilization band. The base case (probability roughly 55 percent) carries homicides in the 28 to 35 range, oil production around 460 to 475 thousand barrels per day with Petroecuador absorbing post Yasuni decline through Sacha and Pungarayacu acceleration, and electricity supply secured through the new thermal commissioning. GDP growth recovers to 1.8 to 2.4 percent (IMF April 2026 WEO range), with the EFF program on track and the dollarized regime stable. The political ceiling for further mano dura escalation appears to be the constitutional limit on indefinite states of exception, currently being litigated.

The downside case (roughly 30 percent) sees gang reorganization in the second half of 2026, possibly under new external sponsorship (CJNG affiliated brokers, Albanian or Italian buyers expanding Pacific procurement), homicides re ascending toward 40 plus per 100,000, and a deterioration in the runoff coalition. A renewed drought or a Coca Codo Sinclair turbine failure would compound the energy fragility. In this scenario the IMF program slips, sovereign spreads widen above 1,200 basis points, and Noboa risks losing the 2027 mid term legislative ballot.

The upside case (roughly 15 percent) requires three things to align. First, a sustained homicide compression to sub 25 by year end, validating the Bukele template at scale. Second, mining sector commissioning of Cascabel and Loma Larga environmental permits, allowing 4 billion US dollars of FDI. Third, a productive cooperative use agreement at Manta that brings US naval and air assets without triggering the constitutional bases prohibition. In this case, Ecuador exits the high yield distress bucket and re rates toward Colombia and Paraguay credit metrics. For investors and operators, the operative posture is real options: monitor the homicide curve monthly, the EFF reviews quarterly, and the mining permit calendar by named project. Strategos reference scenario set is calibrated to these three branches.

Sources #

Cite this brief

@misc{hossen2026ecuadornoboasecurity2026,
  author = {Hossen, Md Deluair},
  title  = {Ecuador's Mano Dura at the Inflection: Noboa's Security Doctrine, Energy Squeeze, and the 2026 Outlook},
  year   = {2026},
  url    = {https://deluair.com/consultancy/insights/ecuador-noboa-security-2026},
  note   = {Deluair Consultancy briefs}
}

Hossen, M. D. (2026). Ecuador's Mano Dura at the Inflection: Noboa's Security Doctrine, Energy Squeeze, and the 2026 Outlook. Deluair Consultancy briefs. https://deluair.com/consultancy/insights/ecuador-noboa-security-2026

Hossen, Md Deluair. "Ecuador's Mano Dura at the Inflection: Noboa's Security Doctrine, Energy Squeeze, and the 2026 Outlook." Deluair Consultancy briefs, 2026-04-26. https://deluair.com/consultancy/insights/ecuador-noboa-security-2026.

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Ecuador's Mano Dura at the Inflection: Noboa's Security Doctrine, Energy Squeeze, and the 2026 Outlook