“Everything will be fine”. Under this motto, the Republican Party candidate has raised his presidential campaign based on order and security after the riots of 2019. José Antonio Kast won the first round backed by the rural vote of the south and that of the north with the four pillars of his speech: homeland, family, order and freedom. His extreme positions and phrases such as “if Pinochet were alive he would vote for me” have haunted him during the campaign. In order to win over a more moderate voter, it has had to reverse several of its proposals such as eliminating the Ministry of Women, offering economic incentives to married couples or building new thermoelectric plants.
He was against the Agreement for Peace signed by the presidents of the political parties that gave him an institutional solution to the social crisis that unleashed the 2019 riots. He also campaigned for the option of rejecting the drafting of a new Constitution.
This is the Chile that Kast has promised to become president:
Economy
It proposes to reduce the value added tax (VAT) from 19% to 17%, and to establish a progressive mechanism of direct benefit to the general population. He wants to reduce the tax on companies subject to growth and with reference to the average of the countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which is around 25%. In addition, he has promised to introduce freedom of hours, hourly work and teleworking and to “streamline” environmental norms and regulations that affect the creation of new companies and new projects.
Pensions
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Kast advocates promoting a mixed pension system, with a solidarity pillar and an individual capitalization pillar, in which the funds are inheritable. The increase in amounts will be gradual, from the current contribution rate of 10% to 14%. There will also be a Universal Basic Pension for all Chileans, except for the 20% with the highest income, and policies to increase formal employment for those over 60 years of age.
Security
His proposal contemplates the intervention of the Armed Forces in La Araucanía, an area plagued by violence, financing the legal defense of any police officer who is “unjustly” detained for fulfilling his duty, creating a police force against organized crime and raising penalties. to murderers and thieves. He also wants to create a National Security Committee to replace the Political Committee of La Moneda and close the National Institute of Human Rights.
Immigration
The candidate of the extreme right has promised to dig a ditch to prevent the entry of immigrants through unauthorized crossings in a section of the border with Bolivia, which would cost about 10 million dollars; establish a new Statute for the Expulsion of Illegal Immigrants; install transitory precincts, military camps and establish preventive migration rings on routes near the border. They will also install the debate to modify the recently enacted Migration Law in Congress.
Women
His campaign talks about protecting against breast cancer, “accompanying the mental health of women” and equalizing the salary with men, but has not offered further details of this proposal. It also wants to strengthen existing programs to encourage the economic autonomy of women through training, increase their labor participation and offer state support to single mothers to facilitate the upbringing and education of their children.
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