Jaime Naranjo, the deputy who delivered a 15-hour speech to delay the vote in the Chilean Congress

A deputy who has spoken for more than 15 hours with just a couple of minimal breaks to go to the bathroom, another who traveled from the extreme south of the country to vote and a third who was in quarantine until midnight for being close contact of a presidential with coronavirus covid-19.

This has been the marathon and agonizing vote of almost 24 hours in the Chamber of Deputies to approve the holding the impeachment trial against the Chilean president, the conservative Sebastián Piñera, for alleged irregularities in the sale in a tax haven of a mining project at the beginning of its first term (2010-2014).

Next, the chronicle of a session that will go down in the annals of Chilean history due to its substance and form.

“ENDURING ORANGE DEPUTY!”

The deputy in charge of presenting the arguments of the opposition to dismiss Pinera, the socialist Jaime Naranjo, he already warned when he arrived at the hemicycle shortly before 10:00 local time: “I’m going to take all the time necessary to read from page 1 to the last one so that no one says they didn’t know the background.”

Sitting stoically in his seat and clothed in by opponents who came and went, Naranjo read the 1,300 pages he had prepared, among which there were rulings from environmental courts, fragments of laws, legal investigations and newspaper articles.

He went to the bathroom only twice, took his blood pressure, changed his mask several times and it was kept all day with water, juice and some raisins: “I have energy and strength (…) It is a fast for the justice of this country. During the military dictatorship I learned to go long hours without eating ”, acknowledged.

With periodic cheers from colleagues and posters of support that you could read “Hold on, deputy Naranjo”, The parliamentarian thus delayed the vote to allow the deputy George Jackson, of the leftist Frente Amplio, will end its quarantine and that the Christian Democrat Jorge Sabag traveled the 500 kilometers to get from the southern Chillán to the Congress, in Valparaíso.

Jackson was confined until 00:00 local time on Tuesday for being close contact with presidential candidate Gabriel Boric, infected with covid-19 last week and still in quarantine.

AND SagabIn an unexpected twist that added even more tension to the day, in the middle of the afternoon he questioned his participation in the vote after presenting some physical discomfort, delaying his arrival in the port city.

He finally made it to the stroke of midnight, but entered incognito and through a side door to avoid possible sanitary controls.

Telematic voting was not allowed in this session and the presence of both was essential for the opposition to get the 78 yeses necessary for the impeachment of Piñera to go ahead.

With a categorical “Chile will judge those who are allowing this impunity in the country,” Naranjo concluded his speech as soon as Jackson entered the chamber., who took a selfie with him and gave him a cake.

A VERY “GRINGA” PRACTICE

Thus, shortly before 8:00 am on Tuesday and with 78 votes in favor, 67 against and 3 abstentions, the constitutional accusation advanced to the Senate, the body that will be in charge of trying the president for the business scandal revealed in the investigation of Pandora’s papers.

The impeachment will be voted on in the upper house – where a higher two-thirds quorum is required and the options are much smaller – just a few days before Chile celebrate next November 21 the most momentous and uncertain elections in your recent history.

Piñera, 71 years old and the fourth largest fortune in Chile, maintains that he dissociated himself from his businesses through blind trusts in 2009 and that what was revealed was already dismissed in 2017, but the Prosecutor’s Office has opened a new investigation.

The strategy used by Naranjo, 70 years old and who for hours was the protagonist in social networks with countless memes about his feat, is known in Chile as “Lazarus Law”, although his name most used globally is parliamentary filibuster.

It is a legal and common practice in countries like the United States, where Republican Ted Cruz spent up to 21 uninterrupted hours speaking in 2013 against the health program of former President Barack Obama.

It has also been used in Chile: the last record was held by the ultra-conservative Jorge Ulloa, who intervened for six hours in 1993 so that a colleague from his bench could vote in the indictment against three Supreme Court magistrates.

After Naranjo, it was the turn of Piñera’s lawyer, Jorge Gálvez, who also displayed a great oratory for almost six hours: “I beg you to reject this unjust constitutional accusation,” he asked a totally exhausted chamber.

The impeachment trial is embittering the last months of Piñera’s mandate, who will leave office in March 2022 if he does not become the first president to be removed in the 30 years of Chilean democracy.

__________________________________