The Civil Aviation Directorate and migration officials in Guayaquil put out a release yesterday saying that Álvaro Noboa Pontón, owner of the Noboa Banana Export company, has not left the country through regular channels. The Internal Revenue Service (SRI) confirms that the businessman does not have permisison to leave the country. The restriction on his movement was established in Sept. 2012 by Miguel Avilés, SRI collections agent. 

Authorities clarified the order after Yvonne Hernández, a judge in the Child and
Adolescent court in Guayaquil, declared a habeas corpus in Noboa’s favour, overruling the restriction created by the SRI agent.

The judge considered that Noboa’s right to free movement was violated by the order. She also gave him recourse to access through litigation any financial reparations he felt entitled to.
One of Noboa’s representative claimed at the habeas corpus hearing on March 20 that the prohibition to leave the country is not valid because it was given by a civil servant, not a judge.

Noboa’s lawyer Sylka Sánchez said yesterday that Noboa has left the country. She says the judge’s order was issued yesterday, and the SRI was not notified. The SRI is after $102 million in unpaid taxes from 2005.

Carlos Marx Carrasco, the SRI’s director, said on Twitter that he hopes Noboa didn’t leave the country illegally, because that would be very serious and set a terrible precedent