When the fares in Chile were planned to be increased, some students waged a fare dodging campaign in the capital Santiago on 07 October 2019, a day after the fare hike took effect. This later escalated into mass protests, as people of different sectors joined and paralysed the country; then-president Sebastián Piñera had the state of emergency declared in different parts of the South American country. The clashes claimed 36 lives as of February 2020 and around 222 eyes in November 2019. Incidents of excessive use of force by security forces were reported, something reminiscent of the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet from 1973 to 1990.
He rose into power after the coup against Salvador Allende (who was democratically elected but due to his socialist alignment was under economic warfare by the United States, which led to his own reduced popularity), a controversial coup where the USA had its hands and its officials aware of the military's plot, but he was not its main player; he was rather appointed as president by the junta. The military dictatorship was marked by two major crises; one was the human rights abuses: tens of thousands were arrested, 40 018 tortured, 2 279 executed, and hundreds missing. The other was the neoliberalisation of the economy which sectors were previously nationalised by the Allende regime, which (i.e., the junta economic policy) failed to withstand the 1982 crisis. Pinochet's predecessor faced popular discontent right before the coup, and so did he himself in the 1980s, forcing his regime to join the club of falling dictatorships at the end of the Cold War.
Pinochet died in 2006, but he left two marks before Chile returned to democracy. The first one was the country's new economic model, shaped by the economists known as the "Chicago Boys". This way of life is one of the causes of the mass protests that started in 2019-- the wide gap between the rich and the poor; education and pension were privatised, the 1% of population having access to 26.5% of Chilean wealth (and half of the low-income earners 2.1%), and many ordinary people stuck in debts. Piñera was unable to manage these issues and the resulting popular anger.
The other mark was the Constitution the junta enacted in 1980 through a questionable plebiscite, still in effect. With the people having fed up with the system in the wake of the 2019 protests, the following year 78.31% of votes called for this constitution to be replaced, although the 2020 referendum only had barely more than 50% turnout, and in 2021 student leader Gabriel Borić defeated José Antonio Kast of the Republican Party, whose father had served the Heer (army of the Nazi Wehrmacht), to succeed Piñera. But Borić might be experiencing what Allende had, sans American interference: low popularity, albeit not too bad like Piñera suffered. High crime rates, inflation and an unstable Cabinet made his approval ratings plummet. This year's corruption scandal involving his allies from the Revolución Democrática (Democratic Revolution) party kept his ratings low.
This hampered his government's efforts to ditch the Pinochet-era constitution; in 2022, only 38.13% of votes were "Yes", and turnout was significantly higher (at 85.84%); there was a reduction compared to 2020 Yes votes (5 899 683 vs 4 860 266), but the main finding here is that those who refrained to vote in the polls for the past two years (2020 and 2021) spoke up mainly in favour of the right wing. This trend continued as rightist blocs like Chile Seguro (Safe Chile, which came at third) and the Republican Party (the victor) exploited the government's low popularity and made gains in the election this May to create the Constitutional Council. With this Council mainly composed of sympathisers of the junta, what's the sense of holding another plebiscite this December? Or what's the sense of holding the May polls?
I would notice two remarks regarding this turmoil: the Borić administration fails to manage the issues it faces, which is the superficial assessment, and this shortcoming reduced its credibility to form a constitution that can help manage the country's condition; and the majority would actually prefer keeping the status quo even if social inequality was its product. I think the people who participated in the 2019 movement and voted Borić kept their faith, and fewer slid back; rather, those who were silent before raised their voices. I am wondering if they were apolitical or unaware of what Chile under the junta was, but the ghost of Pinochet is surely glad with the developments; they saved his constitution, they saved his legacy, they saved the system his junta created. The souls of the lives lost during the dictatorship would anguish, the campaign for the regime change remains frustrated, and the economic hardships might recur.
To exorcise this phantom of Augusto Pinochet, the Chilean masses would need to realise what is wrong with the entire system, and to rise up again.
Article posted on 10 September 2023, 18:52 (UTC +08:00).
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