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Santiago de Chile, March 11 (EFE).- The new president of Chile, the progressive Gabriel Boric, asked Chileans to work together for “a new Chile” in a historic speech with numerous nods to the ousted Salvador Allende (1970-1973). and received with “hope” among his supporters and with skepticism among those who did not vote for him.
“I want you to know that we did not come here just to fill positions, to generate unattainable distances, but to give ourselves body and soul to the commitment to make our country better,” he proclaimed from a balcony of the capital’s Palacio de La Moneda, seat of government.
Amid applause and to the sound of “The united people will never be defeated” and “Chile woke up”, thousands of people listened to the intervention, an event much more informal and close than the traditional morning ceremony, in which he took the oath and received the presidential sash from the hand of his predecessor, the right-wing Sebastián Piñera.
Along with the flags related to Boric, the public also waved fabrics from other minority groups: from the Mapuche indigenous people – who represent 7% of the population -, the feminist movement or the community of sexual diversity.
“The people of Chile are protagonists in this process. We would not be here without their mobilizations,” said Boric during his speech, loaded with gestures towards feminism, environmentalism, social economy or diversity.
The president, who at 36 is the youngest and most voted president in the history of Chile, arrived at the seat of government together with the first lady, Irina Karamanos, and following greeting the public and parading in front of the honor guard, entered the palace to offer his first words.
For the political scientist at the University of Chile, Daniela Campos, this first speech has been “very emotional and loaded with symbolism.”
“He spoke of women, of dissidence, of imaginary peoples. He gave the people a lot of prominence, but he also warned them in some way that he will not be able to do everything in his mandate,” he told Efe.
“We have seen a new takeover, with a lot of participation, less stuffy, without ties. I find this mix interesting and how Boric is going to modernize the institutions with a popular component,” Julieta Suárez-Cao, from the Catholic University, told Efe. Political Scientists Network.
WINKS TO ALLENDE
Once once more, the president cited the socialist Salvador Allende, who in 1973 and in the same palace from where Boric was offering his speech, was overthrown during a bombing that marked the beginning of the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990).
“Always forward, knowing that soon the great malls will open where free men will pass, to build a better society,” he said more than half a century following Allende uttered the same words.
This was not the only gesture to the former socialist president: before entering La Moneda, Boric visited and greeted the statue at the gates of the palace, erected in his honor, in a gesture of homage.
The president also highlighted other Chilean leaders such as Eduardo Frei Montalva (1964-1970), Patricio Aylwin (1990-1994) or Michelle Bachelet (2006-2010 and 2014-2018).
“THE PRESIDENT OF CHANGE”
Boric, who leads an alliance between the Communist Party and the Broad Front, brings a broad social agenda under his arm and, according to experts, embodies the desires of those who took to the streets in 2019 to demand more social rights, better education and health. .
“All my hope, president”, reads the poster of Gladys Ovalle, a retiree from the front line of the public.
“We are here because Chile is going to change. Education has to change, because children take on a lot of debt to study, as well as health and pensions,” he told Efe.
Moira Suyal, a 29-year-old Mapuche indigenous woman, added that she “never thought that Boric would go from student leader to president” in such a short time.
“I am very excited, we have been waiting for someone like this for years. I marched in the streets in 2011 with him, for a better education, and now he is leading the country. This is very exciting. He is the president of change,” she told Efe.
Boric insisted in his speech on the idea of ”repairing the wounds that remained from the social outbreak”, which left around thirty dead, thousands injured and numerous complaints of human rights violations towards the security forces.
He also added that he will “always” promote respect for human rights “regardless of the color of the government that violates them,” in a clear reference to the regimes of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua.
CHALLENGES AHEAD
The former deputy and former student leader stressed that meeting his goals “will not be easy”, and clarified that it will be necessary and invited everyone to support his project, his defenders and detractors, “because the eyes of the world are watching”.
Among the main challenges he cited are: climate change, the energy crisis, the migratory situation on the northern border or violence once morest women and dissidence, he cited.
“We will make mistakes and we will have to correct them with humility, always listening to those who think differently, relying on the people of Chile,” he said.
For the experts, his government marks the beginning of a new political era, since he is the first president outside the two large centrist blocs that governed since the return to democracy in 1990, and he brings under his arm an agenda of profound and the idea of installing a welfare state in Chile.
To achieve this, he flatly stated, “we need to redistribute the wealth produced by those who inhabit our country.”
“My dream is that, when we finish, we can look at our children, our sisters, our neighbors, and feel that there is a country that protects and welcomes us, that cares for us, that guarantees us rights,” he concluded.
Patricia Nieto Marino and Maria M. Mur
(c) EFE Agency