Denialism grows in Chile 50 years after the coup against the government of Salvador Allende

“I justify the military coup”affirmed last July the Chilean deputy Jorge Alessandri regarding the overthrow of the president Salvador Allende in 1973, an echo of a sector of the Chilean right that, according to analysts, manifests “regressions” when justifying or denying the violence of the dictatorship 50 years after the tragedy, and that has grown in recent months within a Chili polarized that bids to make memory.

The words of alessandri They are not an isolated phenomenon, but part of a chorus that is increasingly present in the political discussion of the South American country and that the President of the Republic himself, Gabriel Borichas defined as a “dangerous democratic rollback”.

“(…) That should invite us to reflect that democracy it is not something that is guaranteed”, stressed the president in an interview with the TV program center tablereviewing the path traveled by the current opposition in the last 10 years regarding the coup and its consequences.

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FROM “PASSIVE ACCOMPLICES” TO “URBAN LEGEND”

When commemorating 40 years of the military civilian coupthe then Chilean head of state sebastian pinera aimed, in an unprecedented way in its sector, at the “passive accomplices” of the dictatorship: officials of the Judiciary and civilians who, being aware of the violations of the rights humansThey did nothing.

That line today seems absent and there are several examples: at the end of 2021, the congressman Johannes kaiser affirmed that the prisoners of Pisagua, one of the first detention centers of the regime of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990) in the northern area, “well shot” were.

With a different tone, but part of the same substance, the current president of the Constitutional Council and militant of the far-right Republican Party (PR), Louis Silvapointed out in May that the dictator was a “statist”, and a few weeks ago a deputy close to the PR said that the sexual violence exerted against the political prisoners in the dictatorship is a “urban legend”.

“We have had a certain setback considering that previously the country took certain steps forward in relation to recognizing human rights violations and condemning them. Today we have seen how the heir sector of the dictatorship He has had a very different discourse, claiming responsibility for the coup, justifying, denying or minimizing human rights violations.”, declared to Efe the director of Amnesty International Chile, Rodrigo Bustos.

“On the one hand, the sectors closest to hard Pinochetism have had greater visibility as a result of their electoral results, today it is a sector that has greater political force”, he added.

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“LOSS OF FEAR”

In the opinion of the researcher at the Institute of Society Studies (HEIs), Rodrigo Perez de Arce, Chili comes to this commemoration in a “complex political climate” where “There are not only deep differences regarding the evaluation of the coup, but also in how society should be organized.”

Regarding the proliferation of positions such as that of Alessadri or Silva, Perez de Arce assured EFE that probably “these positions always existed” in the right-wing debate, “But the leaders did not dare to say it out loud.”

“That loss of fear for speaking certain things is part of a freak broader, which has to do with the appearance of disruptive political referents, who seek to say the unsayable and fight against what they call the tyranny of political correctness“, he pointed.

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“RIGHT SPLIT”

For the principal investigator to Latin America of the Elcano Royal Institute, Carlos Malamudthe right has an open flank for its most extreme supporters, who do “gala lavishly” of his “greater harmony with Pinochet”.

However, he acknowledges that the polarization in ChiliAlthough it is accentuated, it is not as strong as in other latitudes. “In Chili there is a whole series of republican values ​​that, beyond polarization, are still valid”he told EFE.

“I would not dramatize so much, of course the Polarization exists, that the tension exists, but still in Chili we find forms, procedures and institutions that in other parts of Latin America They can not be found”, he emphasized.

In the last reportIpsos Keys” published this week, realizes that 74% of Chileans expect democracy to be sufficiently consolidated so that a coup like the one in 1973 will not be repeated for the next 50 years.

In addition, the survey showed that 63% hope that an agreement will be reached in the next five decades regarding what happened on that fateful day, 54% seek to overcome this historical fact and 52% point to effective justice or identification of those who committed crimes.

The 17-year dictatorship led by Pinochet caused the disappearance of 1,469 people, executed political prisonerstortured and imprisoned opponents, in addition to sending thousands to exile.

Source: Elcomercio

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I am Jack Morton and I work in 24 News Recorder. I mostly cover world news and I have also authored 24 news recorder. I find this work highly interesting and it allows me to keep up with current events happening around the world.