BARRIO (Bloomberg) – Ecuador’s President Daniel Noboa wants voters to approve measures to revamp the government’s response to a surge in crime after the nation suffered its bloodiest year ever in 2023.

“It’s possible to combat crime, to have a judicial system that responds with harsher and firmer sentences, and, above all, to create new jobs for Ecuador,” Noboa, 36, said in a video message Wednesday summarizing the referendum that he’d promised during last year’s presidential campaign. 

Ten of the 11 questions he submitted late Tuesday to the Constitutional Court for legal review address crime by involving the military against “transnational criminal organizations.” 

The draft package of questions for voters also will seek harsher sentences in cases of terrorism and its financing, organized crime including drug trafficking and murder for hire. The national murder rate soared to 46.5 per 100,000 residents in 2023, up from 25.9 per 100,000 residents in 2022, according to newspaper El Universo.

In late December, Ecuador’s congress approved a constitutional reform to allow the military to cooperate with the national police without requiring an emergency presidential decree. After a probe last month revealed that a drug gang bribed prosecutors and judges, the referendum draft also calls for an audit of judges’ assets. 

The referendum’s lone question unrelated to crime is whether to allow casinos to reopen after they were closed following a 2011 referendum. Noboa didn’t include questions on pressing economic issues like the future of fuel subsidies or more flexible labor regulations.

If approved by the court, the vote will go ahead in the first week of March in Ecuador’s ninth referendum since 2006