The Frente Amplio (FA), the coalition of left-wing Chilean President Gabriel Boric, has announced that it will reject, in the plebiscite on December 17, the proposal for a new Constitution that was approved on Monday by the Constitutional Council with 33 votes from the opposition. and 17 against the ruling party, a result that reflects the absence of consensus between both sectors. The bloc’s position joins that of the Socialist Party, the main political support of the president’s Administration, which on Wednesday also made public its rejection, like the PPD, of the ruling center-left.
“With disappointment we have seen how this second process has been marked by the sectarianism of a political sector, ignoring citizen expectations, writing a text that will deepen inequalities, division and injustices in our country,” said the ruling bloc in a statement released this Thursday.
The position of the FA, of which the Social Convergence parties – in which Boric is a member -, Democratic Revolution and Comunes are part, is far from being a surprise, since weeks ago the left had shown their criticism of a project that they have branded as conservative, identity-based and regressive in social rights. And although the Government has assumed an administrative role in the process and has decided not to make its opinion transparent for now, the call for the option Against its bloc makes its position even more obvious: its coalition described the new Constitution as “a “Extreme text that does not promote the unity of our country in any sense.”
The conglomerate, although it has lost power in Boric’s Cabinet with respect to Democratic Socialism, has as representatives figures very close to the president. Among them is the Minister of Women Antonia Orellana, who is part of the political committee of La Moneda and is a member of the president’s same party, as are his Ministers of Economy, Nicolás Grau, and Energy Minister Diego Pardow. In addition to Javiera Toro (Comunes) in Social Development and Marcela Sandoval (Democratic Revolution) in National Assets.
A few days ago, before the proposal was approved, Boric’s partner, Irina Karamanos, also from Convergencia Social, criticized the text according to what the American digital media Axios. “It seems worrying that parts of a constitutional draft reduce opportunities or close even more doors than Pinochet’s Constitution,” said the specialist in non-discrimination education at the University of Heidelberg.
The bloc has also announced, along the same lines as the left-wing president did in March, that in the event that the project is rejected in the referendum, “as parties and movement of the Frente Amplio we rule out a third constitutional process during the mandate of President Boric, as the conditions for this do not exist” and that “political efforts must be aimed at resolving debts with citizens in matters of pensions, health and education.”
With just over 40 days until the plebiscite, the Communist Party needs to formalize its position on Friday, which will also reject the text, and which has three ministers in key positions in the Boric Administration: spokesperson Camila Vallejo; Jeannete Jara in Work and Nicolás Cataldo in Education.
🔴 The Frente Amplio announces its vote “Against” the proposal for a new Constitution, presented on Monday, October 30, because it is a project that does not unite the country. The text is inconsistent and represents serious setbacks pic.twitter.com/CEcTIqgiTH
— Social Convergencia (@la_convergencia) November 2, 2023
The contradictions and the ghost of Pinochet
The Constitutional Council is made up of 50 elected delegates. Of them, six are socialists, two are communists, four are from Social Convergence and four are from the Democratic Revolution (RD). Alihuén Atileo, the only representative of the Mapuche people, joined the RD bench as an independent. He was one of the first to call for a vote against.
But the majority, and this is what explains the votes with which the proposal was approved, are from the opposition: 33. Of them 22 from the Republican Party, from the extreme right led by former presidential candidate José Antonio Kast, who promoted a new Constitution that the ruling party has said is a setback, even with respect to the current Fundamental Charter, the same one that they have wanted to change for years.
The text will be formally delivered on November 7 to Boric so that he can call the December referendum. Although the Government has taken a stance of disregard for this process, it is known that they do not like the text. The president, for example, has said twice that he is “concerned” about the proposal. And, once it was approved, he pointed out that “mistakes were made that were also made in the previous process and that, in that sense, learning was not integrated as we all would have expected.”
This previous process to which Boric refers, and to which Frente Amplio and the Socialist and Communist parties supported, is the Constitution proposal presented by a convention composed of conventional members of the radical left and whose majority came from social movements opposed to political parties. . It was a text that citizens rejected by 62% in a plebiscite in September 2022 and that proposed profound changes to Chilean institutions and that the right called, at that time, also as identity-based and extreme, but also refoundational.
The Socialist Party defines voting against the text of the Constitutional Council. It is not a surprise, because they enthusiastically and without hesitation supported the refounding and divisive text of the Constituent Convention. Those who voted yes are against a better Chile pic.twitter.com/Nw9oyxYmPY
— José Antonio Kast Rist 👍🇨🇱 (@joseantoniokast) November 1, 2023
This second attempt by Chile in almost four years to change the Constitution has had a series of complexities and contradictions. On the one hand, the Republican Party, which has called for voting in favor, never wanted to change the current Magna Carta. But, by sweeping the conventional elections in May and seeing that his amendments were easily approved with the votes of the traditional right, he has indicated that this proposal is “better” than the current Magna Carta.
On the other hand, the left, who have historically promoted the replacement of the Constitution because, although it has been reformed more than 60 times in democracy and since 2005 it has been signed by former socialist president Ricardo Lagos (2000-2006), they assign it a sin of origin since he was born in 1980 during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990). However, later the proposal will only have the votes of the right, today the ruling party faces an unprecedented scenario by choosing to keep the Magna Carta that they have criticized.
One of the phrases that reflects this dilemma was uttered by María Pardo, counselor for Social Convergence, shortly before the final vote: “I never thought I would be defending Pinochet’s Constitution,” she said in an interview with the Emol news portal.
The ruling party has unanimously agreed on the criticism of the proposal. For example, although the social State was consecrated, which was the aspiration of the left, he assures that it has been weakened because the right included the same model that the current Fundamental Charter has: a subsidiary State that, although it is not written on paper , implies that the private sector also plays a leading role in social benefits, such as health and pensions.
Furthermore, the change of a word in a norm, according to the left, could have consequences in the application of the three-causal abortion law that was approved in 2017 and that allows the interruption of pregnancy in case of danger to the mother’s life, fetal malformation and rape. This is because the Republican Party promoted the replacement of the phrase in the current Charter, “the law protects the life of the unborn” with “the law protects the life of the unborn.”
#Borics #Broad #Front #reject #proposal #Constitution #plebiscite