First modification:
Chile is ready to go to the polls this Sunday, December 19, to decide between two opposites: José Antonio Kast, on the far right and Gabriel Boric, on the left. Both closed their campaigns as poll data was released, giving Kast a slight lead over Boric.
In closing ceremony, Kast, who is criticized for his defense of the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet, has criticized Boric for his alliance with the Communist party,
“What we are seeing here is a debate trapped in the trenches of the Cold War, of communism against fascism,” said Kenneth Bunker, director of consultancy Tresquintos, who noted that “virulence and polarization” could put off some voters. “It is the old division from left to right,” he stressed.
Many Chileans support the free market policies that propelled the copper-rich country into decades of growth and made it a bastion of economic stability in the volatility of Latin America. But a growing number want changes to address deep inequalities.
Some of the lawsuits have arisen over low pensions, which critics attribute to Chile’s highly privatized system, while others have criticized the high costs and sometimes dubious quality of privatized education and the gaps between public health care. and private.
Conservative voters have raised questions about increased immigration and there are law and order concerns sparked by protests in the capital and violent clashes between police and indigenous Mapuche groups in the south of the country.
How are the polls going?
Kast, who obtained a partial majority in the first round on November 21, has 48.5% of the intention to vote, ahead of Boric with 48.4%, according to a poll of 2,218 potential voters carried out by the group. consulting firm AtlasIntel.
In the first round, Kast obtained 27.9% of the votes and Boric 25.8%.
The first polls after the initial round favored the left-wing politician and former leader of the Boric student movement in several points, but that advantage has diminished in recent days.
More moderate voters, polls show, have leaned more toward Boric than Kast, although the gap is narrowing. However, the story is potentially against Boric. Since 1999, the winner of the first round has always won the second round.
Just over 15 million Chileans can vote in Sunday’s elections.
Voting begins at eight in the morning local time and will end at six in the afternoon. Results are expected to come in fairly quickly on Sunday night.
Presidential in the middle of a Constituent Assembly
The elections are also framed by the social protests that shook the country in 2019. The protesters complained about the social and economic inequality that Chile is experiencing.
President Sebastián Piñera, to try to avert the crisis, called for a plebiscite to change the Constitution that dates from the time of the dictatorship. Seventy-eight percent of voters overwhelmingly responded at the polls with a yes to the change in the Magna Carta.
Whoever wins the presidency will have to be in charge of the referendum to approve or reject the text of a new constitution during their first year in office.
For Marco Moreno, director of the government school of the Central University of Chile, the winner will have to “face a different Congress than the current one, a more balanced Congress, almost split in two.
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