León Febres Cordero, at 77, dominant Ecuadoran leader

León Febres Cordero was dubbed the ''owner'' of Ecuador by his opponents. He served as president from 1984 to 1988. (reuters/file)

QUITO, Ecuador - Former president León Febres Cordero, the colorful right-wing leader who dominated Ecuadoran politics for almost two decades and was dubbed the "owner" of the nation by his opponents, died Monday. He was 77.

Close friend and political confidant Alfonso Harb said Mr. Febres Cordero - who survived five heart bypass operations, two bouts with cancer, and three bullet wounds - died of complications from pulmonary emphysema caused by a lifetime of chain-smoking.

Sporting a mane of white hair and a cigarette hanging from his lip, the leader known simply as "Leon" or "Lion," was an old-fashioned, bare-knuckled Latin American strongman who towered over Ecuador's right for half a century.

"He's the last caudillo. There won't be any more like him," his former vice president, Blasco Penaherrera, once said.

Mr. Febres Cordero, who was president of Ecuador from 1984 to 1988, was a bitter enemy of current President Rafael Correa, whom he called a communist. Correa shot back, calling Febres Cordero "a political dinosaur."

But Correa put aside their differences Monday and declared three days of national mourning for his old adversary.

Born in the Pacific port city of Guayaquil and educated in the United States as a mechanical engineer, Mr. Febres Cordero as one of only three presidents in the past 27 years to finish their terms in this politically unstable Andean nation.

After his term ended in 1988, Mr. Febres Cordero dominated Ecuador's Congress and courts as head of the conservative Social Christian party until his failing health forced his withdrawal from politics in 2002.

A lover of horses and a prize-winning sharpshooter in his younger days, Mr. Febres Cordero carried a pistol as president. In his later years, he was known to tuck a miniature .38-caliber automatic under his shirt before going out, a gift from the US Secret Service when he visited the White House in 1985.

The first Latin American president to champion free-market economics in the 1980s, Mr. Febres Cordero won warm support from a fellow conservative icon, Ronald Reagan.

He was constantly at war with Congress, facing down an impeachment effort by rallying the military's support and surrounding the Supreme Court with tanks to stop judges chosen by Congress from assuming their posts. He also survived two military rebellions and a kidnapping by renegade paratroopers who killed three of his bodyguards. He was released 11 hours later after being roughed up.

He applied an iron fist to virtually eliminate the urban, Cuban-inspired guerrilla group Alfaro Vive.

"Exercising leadership, my friend, is not done with smiles," he told the AP in a 2006 interview. "Smiles are good for wooing a woman but not for governing."

His opponents considered him autocratic and accused him of using his party's control over the judicial system to harass his enemies by having them arrested or driving them into exile.

But Mr. Febres Cordero enjoyed unconditional support from Ecuador's right and a large part of the country's population.

He rejected his opponents barb that he saw himself as the "owner" of Ecuador, for which he developed a quick rejoinder: "If I had the influence that people say I have, the country wouldn't be in the shape it is in."

After leaving the presidency in 1988, he served as mayor of Guayaquil from 1992 to 2000.

As head of Ecuador's largest and best organized party he remained the power broker behind Congress. Typically holding a third of Congress's 100 seats, he was guaranteed a virtual veto over legislation.

Forced to withdraw from politics because of his health in 2002, leadership of his party passed to the current mayor of Guayaquil, Jaime Nebot.

Mr. Febres Cordero joked about his health problems.

"My best friends are my cigarettes and my pistols. They don't ask for anything and they're always ready," he said in 2006. "I'm armed all the time because I've been shot at all my life."

To prove it, he showed the bullet wounds he sustained while campaigning for Congress in 1970. He tugged aside his collar to reveal a scar on his left shoulder and pulled up the cuff of his left pants leg to show where a bullet hit below his knee.

A third shot, he said, hit him in the lower back.