Jorge Jamil Mahuad Witt (born July 29, 1949) is an Ecuadorian lawyer and politician and the 51st President of Ecuador from August 10, 1998 to January 21, 2000. In 1998, he won the presidential elections in a very close result. The defeated candidate Álvaro Noboa asked for a vote recount, which was denied by the authority responsible. There was a severe economic crisis in Ecuador (including the 1998–99 Ecuador banking crisis), which had led to a 60% cut in the armed forces budget. Mahuad's popularity rating had fallen from 60% in October 1998 to 6% in January 2000. In the final days of 1999, he announced the dollarization of the economy of Ecuador, along with a number of International Monetary Fund measures.

Mahuad was forced to resign after a week of demonstrations by indigenous Ecuadorians and a military revolt led by Lucio Gutiérrez. He is of Arab and German descent. Before his election as president, he served as Mayor of Quito from 1992 to 1998.

He proposed economic reforms that produced the "dollarization" of the economy. He declared a freeze in bank accounts in order to control rampant inflation.

Gustavo José Joaquín Noboa Bejarano (born 21 August 1937 in Guayaquil, Ecuador) is an Ecuadorian politician, former President of Ecuador (from 22 January 2000 to 15 January 2003) and Vice President during Jamil Mahuad's government.

Noboa studied Political and Social Sciences and is doctor in Law from the Catholic University of Guayaquil. He was Chancellor of the University in 1986-1991 and 1991-1996.

Noboa was governor of Guayas Province from March 1983 to August 1984. In the 1998 presidential elections he was the running mate of Jamil Mahuad, who won. He was sworn in as Vice President of Ecuador on 10 August 1998.

On 21 January 2000 a military coup deposed the government of Jamil Mahuad, and the following day Noboa became President of Ecuador in constitutional order. Noboa had the popular support of the country's indigenous people.

His presidency was marked by attempts to revive the Ecuadorian economy, which was in a recession at the time, including the freeing of $400 million US dollars worth of assets frozen by the previous government. He left office in 2003 after Lucio Gutiérrez was victorious in the 2002 presidential election.

Jaime Nebot (born October 22, 1946) is an Ecuadorian politician. He currently serves as mayor of Guayaquil, which is Ecuador's largest city. Although he is affiliated with the Social Christian Party, he has distanced himself from it and now concentrates more on running the city. Nebot twice ran unsuccessfully for president of Ecuador, and is considered the protege of former president León Febres-Cordero.

Nebot was born to a prominent Guayaquil family. His father, Jaime Nebot Velasco, was a government minister during the administration of President José María Velasco Ibarra (1968–1972). His mother is Sulema Saadi, the daughter of a Lebanese immigrant who came to Ecuador after living in Brazil. Nebot was educated in various Catholic schools, including Colegio Cristóbal Colón in Guayaquil and Colegio San Gabriel in Quito. He has a law degree from Católica Santiago de Guayaquil. He entered politics in 1984, when he was appointed governor of Guayas province (the district encompassing Guayaquil) by then-president León Febres-Cordero. During his tenure as governor he sent police on a three-day operation to evict more than 700 families who were squatting on private land in Guayaquil. During the incident in Taura when President Febres-Cordero was kidnapped by some military officials led by Vargas Passo, Nebot played an important role in the negotiations for his freedom.

Rafael Vicente Correa Delgado (6 April 1963) is the President of the Republic of Ecuador and was the president pro tempore of the Union of South American Nations. An economist educated in Ecuador, Belgium and the United States, he was elected President in late 2006 and took office in January 2007. In December 2008, he declared Ecuador's national debt illegitimate, based on the argument that it was odious debt contracted by corrupt and despotic prior regimes. He then pledged to fight creditors in international courts, and succeeded in reducing the price of the debt letters and continued paying all the debt. He brought Ecuador into the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas in June 2009. To date, Correa’s administration has succeeded in reducing the high levels of poverty, indigence, and unemployment in Ecuador.

Correa's first term in office had been due to end on 15 January 2011, but the new approved constitution written by the new National Assembly mandated general elections for 26 April 2009. In that election, Rafael Correa won in the first round with 51.9% of votes counted. It was the first time since 1979 in which a representative was elected without having to face a second round. Consequently, Correa began a new term in office due to end on 10 August 2013, which could be extended by reelection until 2017.