At the legislativeelections, 20 October 2002, the party won at least two out of one hundred seats, and additional seats in alliances with other parties. Its leader, Lucio Gutiérrez, a key figure in the 2000 coup d'état, formed an alliance with the indigenous Pachakutik Movement and won 20.3% of the vote in the presidential elections of the same day, winning the second round with 58.7%. His campaign appealed especially to indigenous citizens and lower-class voters.[2] However, Gutiérrez was deposed in 2005, and replaced with Alfredo Palacio, an independent. Gutiérrez subsequently returned to Ecuador and was imprisoned for five months before being released.[5][6] He was not allowed to participate in the 2006 election to succeed Palacio, as his political rights were suspended.[7]
His brother, Gilmar Gutierrez, was the Society's presidential candidate in 2006. Gilmar received 17% of the vote and came in third place. However, his party won 23 seats, making it the second-largest party in the National Assembly, where no party had a majority. Defections to the government left the January 21 Patriotic Society with 19 seats.
Lucio Gutiérrez recovered his political rights in 2008[8] and has unsuccessfully run for president again in 2009 and 2013.
^Murphy, Walter F. (2007), Constitutional Democracy: Creating And Maintaining a Just Political Order, Johns Hopkins University Press, p. 389
^ abLevitt, Barry S. (2007), "Ecuador 2004–2005: Democratic Crisis Redux", Promoting Democracy in the Americas, p. 231
^Becker, Marc (2013), "Ecuador: Indigenous Struggles and the Ambiguities of Power", The New Latin American Left: Cracks in the Empire, Rowman & Littlefield, p. 218
^Becker, Marc (2011), Pachakutik: Indigenous Movements and Electoral Politics in Ecuador, Rowman & Littlefield, p. 79
