QUITO, Ecuador - In a deal worked out with Ecuador's powerful military, Congress named the vice president to the top executive post yesterday, ending a political crisis that threw this small Andean country into chaos.
Lawmakers selected Rosalia Arteaga, 40, as Ecuador's president early yesterday to replace deposed chief executive Abdala Bucaram. Congress ousted Bucaram on Thursday for "mental incapacity," and his refusal to step down sparked a crisis in which three people claimed the presidency.
Congressional leaders and military commanders worked out an agreement early yesterday that puts Arteaga "temporarily" in power until Congress amends the constitution to clarify who succeeds a deposed president.
At that point, Arteaga would return to being vice president and Fabian Alarcon, Congress' original pick for chief executive, would become interim president. Elections would be held within a year and the winner would begin a four-year term in August 1998.
Arteaga's selection as president is a rarity in Latin America, which has seen only two female presidents before her - Violeta Chamorro in Nicaragua and Isabel Peron in Argentina.
"She is an ambitious woman," Bucaram said after learning of Congress' decision.
The unanimous vote in Congress brought relief to Ecuadoreans, who watched street protests against Bucaram become increasingly violent and culminate in a nationwide 48-hour strike last week. People had feared the military might intervene.
Police yesterday removed the barbed wire that had kept protesters away from the government palace, and families again wandered through the area, enjoying a quiet day in Quito's colonial center.
Bucaram continued to insist he was the constitutionally elected president, but conceded that he had lost power to "conspirators" supported by the armed forces.
"What is being formed in Congress is a civilian dictatorship," he said in his stronghold of Guayaquil, where he flew Friday night after barricading himself in the national palace for three days.
"Remember me," he said. "In a short time these same people are going to beg me on their knees to come back."