The homily of the archbishop of Santiago, Fernando Chomalí, was heard this Friday several streets from the metropolitan cathedral, where the funeral of former president Sebastián Piñera (1949-2024) was held. The voice of the priest highlighting how the pain of the sudden death crossed the family and the political world to settle in the Chilean town, sneaked into hairdressers, restaurants and clothing stores. Hundreds of people gathered in Plaza de Armas, in front of the religious temple, followed the ceremony through huge screens displayed and under the strong sun of the South American summer. Some clever people made long efforts to get the police to allow them to enter the church, swearing to heaven that they were very, very close to the former president. But they were not lucky. Unlike the wake, only family, friends, former collaborators and authorities were able to participate in the funeral in the cathedral. That did not stop people from applauding and being moved by the grandchildren's speeches to their late grandfather.
“You were faithful to your principles, despite the fact that some tried to undermine democracy, freedom and progress, you always had the conviction that it was the way for Chile to be a better country,” read Sebastián Piñera Morel, the oldest of his four children, who, visibly saddened, repeated the pride he felt in his father and the peace of mind it gave him to have seen him so happy the last two years. That sensation was repeated among those close to him. One of his granddaughters, Esperanza, with a broken voice, said before the packed cathedral: “Tata, you once told me that in life two forces confront each other, fear and courage. You told me that fear leads us to not want to change things, to not want to move forward, to not want to continue and not to want to look. I think that at this moment I feel afraid of not wanting to move forward without you, of not wanting to continue a life without you, the best grandfather.” Her speech drew applause outside the church.
A special moment at the funeral was when one of the 33 miners rescued in 2010 during Piñera's first government spoke. Luis Urzúa, the shift leader when the accident occurred, said that in the San José mine there were 33 flags and not 33 crosses thanks to the fact that Piñera had taken a risk to get them out of there. He invited the other miners present in the temple, all with their helmets, and announced that, as a tribute to the former president, they will add a new flag in the mine, reaching 34. “A farewell to a great boss on duty from another boss on duty,” he stated.
Inside the cathedral, security personnel distributed water to relatives sitting in the first pews and attendees sought the air expelled by the deployed fans. The venue was packed with family, friends, ministers, former secretaries of state, former collaborators, businessmen, managers and politicians from almost all political sectors. In the last rows, the leader of the Republican Party, José Antonio Kast, listened attentively to the ceremony. Later, the closest former ministers were located, such as Andrés Chadwick, who is also a cousin of the deceased ex-president and his former Minister of the Interior, Gonzalo Blumel. Both read petitions with Piñera's children.
His friends from the business side also came to say goodbye to him, such as the former controllers of the Latam airline, the brothers Ignacio and Enrique Cueto, who lost their father José just over two weeks ago. Also Carlos Alberto Délano, owner of Empresas Penta, one of the financial conglomerates most questioned by the cases of illegal financing of politics that broke out in 2014, who was speaking with Alfredo Moreno, former chancellor and former minister of Social Development and Public Works. Other business friends present were José Cox along with his wife Loreto Alcaíno, and Ignacio Guerrero. Both were the last to see the former president alive. Piñera took off his helicopter on Tuesday in Lake Ranco, in the south of Chile, from Cox's house, and Guerrero was his co-pilot in the aircraft from which he managed to get out and save himself alive along with his son Bautista and Magdalena Piñera, sister of the Ex leader.
The funeral took place in a republican climate that does not occur easily in other countries in the region. In addition to the last Guard of Honor carried out by President Gabriel Boric together with the former Christian Democrat president Eduardo Frei (1994-2000) and the former socialist president Michelle Bachelet (2006-2010, 2014-2018), as well as the president of the Senate and the Supreme Court . Boric said this morning at the ceremony in the former National Congress as a parliamentarian he was an opponent of Piñera. “I don't regret it, because that's how democracies work. Being in the chair [Bernardo] O'Higgins has allowed me to understand and assess his role,” and added: “During his government, complaints and recriminations sometimes went beyond what was fair and reasonable. We have learned from it and we should all do.”
Former President Bachelet, for her part, maintained that Piñera promoted a right that could distance itself from authoritarianism. “Both in the dictatorship and the outbreak, he chose the institutional solution of giving power to citizens through voting,” said the socialist, who highlighted that it was the former president who commissioned the UN report on human rights violations during the social outbreak. “It was in the presidency that Piñera paid the highest price for being an authority, because painful decisions have to be made and public scrutiny is relentless,” she added.
The funeral procession passed through the Plaza de la Constitución, in front of the La Moneda Palace, the seat of the Government of the South American country. In that place he received a last tribute from Boric, who declared three days of national mourning and personally went to receive the coffin and Piñera's family at the airport when they arrived from southern Chile. The closing of this atmosphere of gathering of the entire political class was sealed with the delivery of the flag that covered the coffin of the former president to his widow, Cecilia Morel, by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alberto Van Klaveren.
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