VP: How do you explain that? Does it make any sense to you?

RP: We can’t understand how someone who used to brag about being part of the Citizen Revolution, who used to call it “a legend” and used to say that he was part of the “Rafael Correa legend” can possibly be doing what he is doing. He knows us personally, he knows we are committed to the people on principle, that we are not criminals at all. So, why then? Inevitably you must wonder at what point he began to work with the CIA, as that’s exactly what he has done, at what point he and the CIA agreed to take down the Citizen Revolution project that we had built over a ten-year period. I can’t say what happened, but it is a fact that members of his inner circle were exposed by WikiLeaks as CIA informers, including Andrés Michelena, the current Telecommunications minister.

VP: Surely that can’t have happened overnight. It wouldn’t make sense.

RP: Obviously he lied to us, which is bad. But the fact that he lied to the public, to the electorate, is even worse. Clearly he was lying on the campaign trail, when he described the policies he knew he’d disregard because he was plotting to try and take down the Citizen Revolution.

VP: Could the funding he might have received possibly account for that?

RP: I get the feeling that his personal connections, as a young man, with people who belonged to Ecuador’s traditional circles of power have played a major role. When we were in the government together sometimes he would say that he was off to chat with some friends, the sort of people we call “poshos”, very wealthy, very important people. And he used to say that he’d go down and listen to them, to find out what they thought so that the government would have a better picture of what was going on in the country. But everything suggests there was more to it than that. They had been plotting for some time and he was lying to us. He used that argument to conceal the true nature of that relationship.

VP: Do you think you made a mistake by trusting him and choosing him to be the candidate of your movement?

RP: We certainly did. We were very naïve. Some of us knew each other well, we went back a long way. But him, not so much. He seemed to have very solid humanistic principles, he was someone who had been shot and had overcome the physical disability caused by that. He was a very inspiring public speaker. We felt that was a very important quality. But, truly, we were very naïve. There’s no denying that.

VP: Is the Assange case the key to everything that’s happened? Do you get the feeling that the US waited patiently for the right person to come along at the right time?

RP: There was probably a combination of factors. Of course, Assange being one. But I believe that the US had it in for us ever since we shut down the US military base in Manta. Remember that the US ambassador was expelled, together with a contingent of fifty US troops that she kept in the embassy and we learnt about nearly by chance. This group sought to infiltrate our armed forces.

VP: How do you mean “by chance”?

RP: By chance! We had trouble with an army helicopter and there was an American onboard. Obviously, we asked how come a “gringo” was on one of our choppers. We were told he was one of the troops from the embassy. And it was then that we began to take steps. We are not talking about a military attaché or a technical advisor, but a fifty-strong unit operating within our country.

VP: And Assange came after that …

RP: In 2012, three years after shutting down the base, I personally announced that we were granting political asylum to Assange. Right then it seems that the US decided they’d had enough. Yes, they did.

VP: Your situation at present is very complex on a personal level. President Correa is in exile, some of your colleagues are in jail …

RP: Luckily nowadays modern technology allows us to communicate and get our message across to the people. But, needless to say, it’s not quite the same thing. I used to travel up and down the provinces all the time, talking to our people, listening to them, whereas no human contact is possible from behind a screen.

VP: That’s why you’ve been forced into exile.

RP: Sure. But I must add that this treacherous government has only been in office for two years and we have already had some positive election results. We have won in two of the three largest prefectures of the country, including the capital city. And we have set up a Council of Citizen Participation, which is very democratic and will likely take steps to mend the deinstitutionalisation caused by Moreno’s administration. We look forward to the 2021 elections.

VP: Yet everything becomes very complicated when a government shuns politics and, instead, resorts to a court of law to meddle in an election.

RP: Absolutely! It’s extremely hard! And I should add it is impossible to achieve that without the cooperation of news outlets. The press peddles lies and it is responsible for creating the conditions for society to accept as normal what is not: that some person is kept in jail or is assassinated, even. In Ecuador you have people saying Correa should be killed, Patiño should be killed, like it’s nothing. There is a very persistent campaign to portray Correa supporters as if they were guilty of whatever crimes, as if they were thieves. And when all the media have completed their massive campaign to ruin your reputation, then comes a judge and he cannot hand down a not-guilty verdict, even if he believes you are innocent. Otherwise he would suffer a merciless media bombardment and the elements of the justice system that are controlled by the government would also take action.

VP: How would you define this phenomenon that we are experiencing at the same time in several countries across the world?

RP: I think we need to realise that, apart from the judicialisation of politics, we are witnessing the birth of a political mafia. This mafia knows no boundaries, it will destroy your family if necessary, they will steal any personal assets you may have acquired during your life, if they think they will hurt you that way. Their goal is to destroy you and scare off anyone willing to put up a fight or willing to support you. There are former government ministers who say they are very sorry about what is happening, but they don’t want any trouble because they have young children and they have been threatened unless they comply or get out of the way.