Chileans vote in favour of rewriting Constitution

Amid a yr of contagion and turmoil, Chileans turned out Sunday to vote overwhelmingly in favor of getting a constitutional conference draft a brand new constitution to interchange guiding ideas imposed 4 a long time in the past beneath the army dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet.

The nation’s conservative authorities had agreed with the center-left opposition to permit the plebiscite after the outbreak of huge avenue protests that erupted a yr in the past in frustration over inequality in pensions, training and well being care in what has lengthy been one in all South America’s most developed nations.

The Electoral Service mentioned Sunday evening that with almost all polling stations reporting, about 78% ballots of the 7.three million votes counted favored drawing up a brand new structure, whereas slightly below 22% had been opposed. About 79% supported having the constitution be drafted by a conference of 155 elected residents moderately than a conference with half its members elected residents and half members of congress.

In a speech to the nation, center-right President Sebastián Piñera mentioned acknowledged the victory for these searching for a brand new constitution however cautioned it’s only the beginning of a protracted course of.

“It is the beginning of a path, which together we will have to go through to agree on a new constitution for Chile,” mentioned the president, who had opposed having a brand new structure although he had conceded earlier within the day that it doubtless can be supported by voters.

The particular conference would start drafting a brand new structure that will be submitted to voters in mid-2022.

As Piñera spoke, hundreds of individuals celebrated in a central sq. of the capital used for festivities and protests. Similar gatherings had been held on the outskirts of Santiago.

“What happened in the social outburst is now reflected in the outcome of the plebiscite,” mentioned one celebrant, Paulina León. “I was part of the marches a year ago and I have to take care of my decision and help build a dignified constitution.”

Felipe Caviedes additionally joined in, saying that “I am part of the social diversity that was marginalized 30 years in this country and now, at last, we can create it ourselves. Now there are real changes coming.”

Chile’s present structure was drafted by the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet, and was despatched to voters at a time the place political events had been banned and the nation was topic to heavy censorship.

It was permitted by a 66%-30% margin in a 1980 plebiscite, however critics say many citizens had been cowed into acceptance by a regime that had arrested, tortured and killed hundreds of suspected leftist opponents following the overthrow of an elected socialist authorities.

“I think that many people went to vote out of fear,” mentioned political scientist Claudio Fuentes, who wrote a ebook about that plebiscite titled, “The Fraud.”

“The current constitution has a flaw of origin, which is that it was created during the military dictatorship in an undemocratic process,” mentioned Monica Salinero, a 40-year-old sociologist who helps drafting a brand new constitution.

The free-market ideas embodied in that doc led to a booming economic system that continued after the return to democracy in 1990, however not all Chileans shared.

A minority was capable of reap the benefits of good, privatized training, well being and social safety companies, whereas others had been compelled to depend on generally meager public options. Public pensions for the poorest are simply over $200 a month, roughly half the minimal wage.

Luisa Fuentes Rivera, a 59-year-old meals vendor, mentioned hopes that “with a new constitution we will have better work, health, pensions and a better quality of life for older people, and a better education.”

But historian Felipe Navarrete warned, “It’s important to say that the constitution won’t resolve the concrete problems. It will determine which state we want to solve the problems.”

Claudia Heiss, head of the political science division on the University of Chile, mentioned it might ship a sign about individuals’s wishes for change, and for a form of politics that will “allow greater inclusion of sectors that have been marginalized from politics.”

Conservative teams concern the revamp might go too far, and endanger elements of the structure which have helped the nation prosper.

“The people have demonstrated saying they want better pensions, better health, better education. and the response of the political class” is a course of that received’t remedy the issues and can open a interval of uncertainty,” mentioned Felipe Lyon, 28-year-old lawyer and spokesman for the group “No, Thanks” that opposes the change.

The determination to permit the vote got here after tons of of hundreds of Chileans repeatedly took to the streets in protests that usually turned violent.

The vote was initially scheduled for April, however was delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic which has killed some 13,800 Chileans, with greater than 500,000 individuals contaminated by the brand new coronavirus.

Officials attempting to make sure voters felt protected barred contaminated individuals or these near them from the polls, and lengthy traces shaped at voting locations. Voters needed to put on masks — dipping them solely briefly for identification functions — and introduced their very own pencils.