Chile commemorates the historic march of the million people in 2019 and a year of the plebiscite

Chile This Monday commemorates the second anniversary of the historic march of more than a million people in Santiago during the social protests of 2019 and a year of the plebiscite in which more than 78% of the voters supported changing the Constitution inherited from the dictatorship ( 1973-1990).

Two demonstrations of citizen strength that, peacefully and institutionally, managed to initiate profound changes in a society that rose up against inequality, after protesting against a state absent in social issues and criticizing a model of great macroeconomic successes from which a business elite benefited and politics.

SIGHT: Chile: Kast Extends First Place Lead Over Boric, Latest Cadem Presidential Poll

On October 18, 2019, Chilean citizens took to the streets to ask for universal health, quality public education and decent pensions in a country where it was imposed during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet a neoliberal plan that, although it produced a great development in the last 30 years, also sharpened social differences.

After weeks of massive marches across the country, punctuated by violent incidents, fires and looting, on October 25, 2019 1.2 million people went to the center of Santiago without prior convocation to participate in what became the largest protest since the return of democracy, a peaceful day of rejection of the government of conservative Sebastián Piñera.

• Chile added more than 2,000 cases of coronavirus for the second consecutive day
• Migrant deaths increase in more dangerous crossings between Chile and Bolivia
• Chile Elections 2021: How did social turbulence creep into the campaign one month after the presidential elections?

“Today’s massive, joyful and peaceful march, where Chileans ask for a more just and supportive Chile, opens great paths for the future and hope”, the president published on his Twitter account after the demonstration.

Pending tasks

The 2019 mobilizations, which left more than 30 dead and international accusations of human rights violations in the repression of the State security forces, led to the convening of a plebiscite to change the Constitution as an institutional solution to the protests, the which was held just one year after that march, on October 25, 2020. 78% voted in favor of changing the Magna Carta.

“Chile shows some progress, but must deepen its efforts to address the violations and abuses committed by the end of 2019 ″, He recalled this Monday a statement from the office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), which after carrying out a technical mission in November two years ago, prepared a report to monitor the implementation of its recommendations.

Jan Jarab, OHCHR representative in South America, said that while they value the efforts, “obstacles persist in the victims’ access to justice, reparation and guarantees of non-repetition, among other fundamental rights.”

He also recalled that the right to peaceful assembly is still regulated by a supreme decree dating from the time of the dictatorship.

Change in construction

“Two years ago, more than a million people marched peacefully to demand an end to inequality. A year ago, for the first time in our history, the public was asked whether or not they wanted a new Constitution. Today, we are turning the tide from Chile”, Chilean writer Jorge Baradit, one of the 155 members of the Constitutional Convention, in charge of drafting the new Chilean Magna Carta, published on social networks.

The result of the plebiscite led to the creation of this convention, which has been in session since July 4, 2021 – for nine months, extendable for three more – to create a fundamental text that collects all the demands that Chileans shouted two years ago in the streets of the whole country.

This text will have to be validated by the citizens again in another democratic act through a mandatory voting plebiscite. “A year ago we voted for a new Constitution, today we are writing it,” wrote the biologist and today the constituent convention Cristina Dorador.

________________________________

• They ate at the Salt Bae restaurant and the service alone cost thousands of dollars
• Nikolas Cruz: Perpetrator of Parkland School Massacre Pleads Guilty to All Charges
• Before she died, teacher Mary Kay Letourneau felt remorse for her relationship with her 12-year-old student
• Mexico: mother would have embalmed her daughter and put it as a mannequin in her store
• They find the belongings of the missing boyfriend of Gabby Petito, the young woman who was murdered in the United States.
• They release the “murderer with red hair”, who at age 13 abused and killed a 4-year-old boy

.

Deshawn