
Leonidas Plaza (18 April 1865-17 November 1933) was President of Ecuador from 1 September 1901 to 31 August 1905 (succeeding Eloy Alfaro and preceding Lizardo Garcia) and from 1 September 1912 to 31 August 1916 (succeeding Francisco Andrade Marin and preceding Alfredo Baquerizo). Plaza was remembered for his dramatic relationship with Eloy Alfaro, his former ally-turned-nemesis; Plaza ultimately died at the foot of a bust of Alfaro in 1932, twenty years after his supporters murdered Alfaro.
Biography[]
Leonidas Plaza was born in Charapoto, Ecuador in 1865. During his youth, he joined Eloy Alfaro's revolutionary army, and he participated in the overthrow of Ignacio de Veintemilla in 1883 and José Plácido Caamaño in 1884. Plaza was later exiled to Panama in 1885, and he participated in Guatemala's civil war before joining the Nicaraguan army and being expelled to Costa Rica in 1893. He was made a general of the Costa Rican army and given command of Alajuela, and Alfaro enabled his return to Ecuador in 1895. He battled conservative counter-revolutions before being elected Alfaro's successor as President in 1901. However, his entente with the conservatives caused a split between himself and Alfaro. He refused to give Alfaro command of the army as promised, and he opened the prisons and restored social harmony in the country. In 1905, he helped his ally Lizardo Garcia defeat Alfaro in the presidential election, and, in 1906, he was ousted in Alfaro's revolution. Plaza was forced to flee to New York before returning to Quito in 1911 after Alfaro's overthrow. He was elected President in 1912, and Alfaro was murdered in prison after a failed attempt to oust Plaza. Plaza served until 1916, and he fought the Concha War against Carlos Concha's radical faction of the liberal camp, ultimately defeating them. He finished his term in 1916 and enabled the victory of his ally Alfredo Baquerizo Moreno in that year's presidential election. He went into exile in California after another revolution in 1925, but he returned to Ecuador in 1929 and died of a heart attack in front of the bust of Alfaro at the Huigra train station in 1932.