Diana Acosta is a former Acuerdo Pais assembly member, now sitting as an independent. She's married to a miner, and abstained in the mining mandate vote. She's on our team, man. Don't get her confused with Lady Greensleeves...heh.

ebear, you say she's on our team? Does this mean she thinks the new constitution will be wrost off than the current? The new constitution removes the community's veto power to shut down mining projects, and also allows Correa to be re-elected as president who is pro-mining. Don't know what the next president will do so wouldn't you and all here think the new constitution is the better version? Comments appreciated.

It's all in the original article that Safeharbour posted. To sumarize, she thinks the new Constitution is a Mamotreto (something big, ugly and stupid) and filled with contradictions. She objects to the way it was rushed through, and how the opposition wasn't given time to voice their concerns, as provided for in the original mandate. She also objects to the way it deals with economic issues, but she doesn't go into specifics.

I mentioned a while back that we'd see defections from Acuerdo Pais, although I must say the Alberto Acosta resignation caught me by surprise. Hers doesn't. She's from Guyas, which means she has a better chance to run as an independent than on the AP ticket. People in Guyas will respect her for what she did, if I've understood Guyas at all. She did her best, but in the end had to stand on her principles - something like that.

If you're asking is the new Constitution (which I've only read parts of) better or worse, you'd have to ask, better or worse for who? We didn't have any problem under the old one, so for us it's mostly a wash. For the poor and working class there are undoubtably some improvements, for business and the economy as a whole - that remains to be seen.

From what I've seen, it looks like an attempt to codify a whole bunch of things that in Canada would be the domain of the legislature. I guess it's an attempt to "lock down" certain things and make them hard to change - in other words, a way to keep the oligarchs from regaining control should they win a democratic majority at some future point. You can repeal statutes, but it's harder to change a Constitution. AP and Correa are counting on the nation's lack of desire to go through this whole sorry exercise all over again. It's not the best way to do things, but maybe it's necessary given conditions on the ground. I'm not Ecuadorean, so there's no way I can tell.

I think its a good thing the AP is splintering though. They have too much power at present and need to come down a few pegs. My guess would be they win a narrow majority, or have to form a coalition to govern after the next election. In any case, once the mining law is in place I wouldn't expect it to be revisited, so from our point of view, that, not the Constitution is the key to moving forward.

Again, I'd guess that the delay (which we should all be used to by now) has to do with the WFT. ie. whether to keep it as is, modify it, or get rid of it altogether. Worst case, if it stands in its present form, Aurelian is still viable and still worth a bundle (see the otto analysis posted earlier) but that's not necessarily true for the industry as a whole.

The basic problem with the WFT is that you don't know until you've done your final cost analysis, or maybe even started mining, how it will be applied. With all the uncertainty inherent in mining, plus the added problem of inflation in everything from labor to materials and energy, you'd have to be crazy to put money into a place with rules like that.

This isn't oil, where you have to go where the oil is, and deal with whoever's there. There's still lots of mineral potential in Mexico, Canada, Peru, Chile, etc. So why bother with Ecuador? I don't know who it is down there that doesn't get this, but IMO they need a good smack upside the head. There's only one reason investors take these risks and that's the windfall. Take that away and you've basically killed the incentive, and thus the industry.

ebear