The Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE) — the country’s most powerful social movement — ended its month-long national strike against the neoliberal Daniel Noboa government on October 22.
The national strike was sparked by the government unilaterally ending the diesel subsidy, a move that Noboa he would not do. The measure food production, transport and construction, contributing to a rise in many basic living costs.
However, protests raised broader demands against the government’s extractivist agenda, people’s deepening insecurity, the rising cost of living and authoritarianism.
The government and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) signed a two-year US$4 billion loan program in May last year, which was augmented by US$1 billion in July. Noboa has followed the to the letter: slashing public funding, including for healthcare and education; expanding extractive frontiers for private capital; dismissing thousands of public sector workers; and further deregulating the financial sector.
During the strike, protesters blockaded hundreds of roads, marched through town centres and held sit-ins and public assemblies, among other forms of protest actions mostly concentrated in the highland provinces.
The government responded with barbaric military and police repression, using teargas, beatings, rubber bullets and live ammunition against protesters.
During the strike, the military conducted involving about 12,000 soldiers. The Alliance for Human Rights Ecuador 391 human rights violations, 473 injuries and 206 arbitrary detentions during the month-long protests. The police and military were also responsible for the deaths of three people.
During a military convoy through Cotacachi, Imbabura province, on September 28 — which the government declared was to provide “humanitarian aid” — soldiers shot and killed 46-year-old Indigenous man, Efraín Fuerez.
Rosa Paqui, a 61-year-old woman belonging to the Indigenous community of Saraguro, from a heart attack after inhaling teargas as police violently repressed a protest in Loja, in the country’s south, on October 14.
Thirty-year-old Kichwa man died after being by the military — part of another “humanitarian” convoy — in Otavalo, Imbabura, on October 15. Even serving army general Manuel Dávila was forced to on October 21 that there was an “excessive use of force” by the military related to Guamán’s death.
Even after the national strike had ended, state repression continued. The military and police a peaceful march on October 23 held to pay tribute to Efraín Fuérez in Cotacachi, launching teargas canisters and kettling people.
Eleven of the “Otavalo 12” — Indigenous Kichwa youth baselessly accused of “terrorism” and arbitrarily detained in maximum-security prisons — were only on October 24 after 32 days in detention.
No concessions
Significantly, the national strike ended without forcing concessions from the government, unlike in previous mobilisations.
In 2019, a CONAIE-led national strike against then-President Lenín Moreno’s decision to scrap fuel subsidies forced a hasty retreat. In 2022, another uprising blocked the Guillermo Lasso government’s attempts to raise diesel and liquefied petroleum gas prices.
Why were the social movements, which defeated nearly identical neoliberal measures just a few years ago, unable to prevail?
One reason was Noboa’s swift and brutal military response to the announced strike. He announced a 60-day “” in nearly all the highland provinces, imposing curfews, suspending the right to free assembly and granting police and the army sweeping powers.
Noboa temporarily divided the executive branches of government, relocating the presidency from Quito to Latacunga, Cotopaxi province, and the vice-presidency to Otavalo, Imbabura — reinforced by an unprecedented military and police presence.
The two provinces, home to large Indigenous communities, were of mobilisation during the 2019 and 2022 uprisings — thus, the relocation of government was a calculated strategy to neutralise points of resistance and keep major protests away from Quito.
In previous uprisings, protesters were able to reach Quito — a symbolic and economic centre — disrupt normal functioning and occupy government buildings. This time, Noboa’s brutal militarisation confined the protests to the rural highland regions.
, along with police, were deployed to prevent mass mobilisations from reaching Quito and paralysing the capital.
Authoritarianism
Since taking office in November 2023, Noboa has deepened authoritarianism and criminalised protest.
For example, the government introduced the in June, which allows intelligence agencies to intercept phone calls, collect people’s private information and conduct surveillance without a court order.
The law widens intelligence agencies’ powers to spy on citizens, which the government especially uses to target grassroots activists. It was in August that the country’s national intelligence agency was operating a 16-person espionage network to track former CONAIE President Leonidas Iza, which included a plan to “disappear” him.
The so-called , enacted in August, forces civil society organisations to disclose private information, such as the personal information of all their members and geographic location of their projects, or face punitive measures, even dissolution.
Notably, the law does not apply to the private sector, despite systemic corruption, tax evasion and links to organised crime, particularly in the country’s . The law is not focused on cracking down on illegal activities, as the government claims, but on targeting grassroots organisations.
Indeed, during the most recent strike, the government CONAIE’s bank accounts, along with those of other grassroots organisations — such as the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon and the Cotopaxi Indigenous and Peasant Movement — with powers granted under the new law.
The government also the transmissions of various grassroots Indigenous television and radio stations. At the same time, the corporate media — the mouthpieces of the economic oligarchy — smeared protesters as “” linked to .
A few days before CONAIE’s announcement, Noboa abandoned planned dialogues between grassroots organisations and the government and announced he would use “all the force of the state” to bring an end to the strike.
“In light of this reality,” the CONAIE read, “we have made a difficult but necessary decision: to end the strike, clear the roads and withdraw to our territories to protect the lives of our people”.
CONAIE demanded that the government: immediately demilitarise all territories; release those detained during the protests; provide care and reparations to the families of those killed and to those injured who require medical treatment; and stop persecuting CONAIE’s leaders.
While CONAIE, along with most organisations, backed down from the strike, some groups in Imbabura declared they would continue. The Union of Peasant and Indigenous Organisations of Cotacachi held an on October 22 and vowed to “continue the struggle”.
The Confederation of Peoples of Kichwa Nationality (ECUARUNARI) confirmed the end of the national strike in an , reiterating that decision was “in respect for the organisational structure of CONAIE … but not as a sign of retreat or surrender in our struggle for our just rights”.
“We declare ourselves in permanent assemblies within our organisational structures, with the aim of raising a unified voice of rejection in the face of the neoliberal and indifferent policies of the current government.”
Referendum
CONAIE and other grassroots movements are regrouping and concentrating efforts on defeating a national referendum and popular consultation on November 16.
Noboa is seeking to the Constitution — which is only possible through a national referendum — to allow foreign military bases in the country, eliminate obligatory state funding for political parties and the size of the national assembly from 151 MPs to 73.
The final question — the popular consultation — is to decide whether to establish a constituent assembly to write a new constitution tailored to Noboa’s neoliberal project. The current constitution was won through mass mobilisations and enshrines important safeguards, such as prohibiting the privatisation of public services, protecting the collective rights of workers and Indigenous people and recognising the rights of nature.
By scrapping these protections, Noboa aims to accelerate privatisation, deregulate labour and finance, and open the country further to transnational mining and oil companies.
“We reiterate an emphatic NO to the referendum and the 2025 popular consultation,” the ECUARUNARI statement read. “Processes that do not resolve the real problems of the country, such as insecurity, lack of investment in education and health, unemployment nor the absence of public policies that protect agricultural and livestock producers, small businesses and the popular and solidarity economy.”