Headlines, Latin America & the Caribbean

POLITICS-CHILE: Tough Times Ahead for Centre-Left Government

Alicia Sánchez

SANTIAGO, Dec 18 2001 (IPS) - The growth of the right-wing opposition in Sunday’s parliamentary elections in Chile will stand in the way of bills sponsored by the centre-left government, which require a special majority in Congress.

The campaign slogan of the rightist Alliance for Chile was “Change”, even though the coalition has opposed labour reforms designed to expand recognition of workers’ rights, a law that would finally make divorce legal, and another law regulating campaign financing.

The growth of the far-right Independent Democratic Union (UDI), which forms part of the Alliance for Chile and is headed by former presidential candidate Joaquín Lavín, was attributed by observers to a populist campaign platform and the weakness of Chile’s social movement.

The governing Coalition of Parties for Democracy will maintain its relative majority in the legislature to convene on Mar 11. But the UDI emerged from Sunday’s elections as the single strongest party, eclipsing the Christian Democracy Party (PDC) by winning 35 seats in the Chamber of Deputies.

The entire lower house was up for renewal in the elections, as were 18 seats in the Senate, half of those that are directly elected by voters.

After 12 years in the government and in the context of an economic slowdown, the governing coalition took 47.92 percent of the vote in the Chamber of Deputies and 51.31 percent in the elections for the Senate.

Meanwhile, the Alliance for Chile won 44.28 percent of the votes in the lower house and 44.03 percent in the upper house. Turn-out stood at roughly two-thirds of voters.

The number of ruling coalition deputies shrank from 70 to 62, while the representatives of the Alliance for Chile in the lower house increased from 48 to 56. Each coalition won nine seats in the Senate, with not a single woman among them.

Economist Hugo Fazio of the National Centre for Alternative Development said the Coalition of Parties for Democracy was committing an error by interpreting the outcome of the elections as support for the government of socialist President Ricardo Lagos.

Lagos said the results demonstrated “the people’s backing” for his government. “That moves us, and holds us to our promises, because these are difficult times. Just look at the world. Tonight the prophets of pessimism have not won. A parliament for Chile has triumphed,” he said.

In Fazio’s view, the platform of the right-wing alliance headed by the UDI “was based on a discourse opposed to the Coalition government, even though the administration is following the same policies as were followed by the dictatorship, of which (the UDI) formed a part.”

The UDI is made up of former officials of the de facto military regime of General Augusto Pinochet (1973-90) – who did not vote Sunday, as he was sick in bed – and leaders who received their political training under the party’s founder, Jaime Guzmán, who was assassinated in 1991.

The Communist Party and other small forces will remain outside of parliament, partly due to Chile’s electoral system, according to which two lawmakers are elected in each district, one for each of the two parties that take the most votes.

But above and beyond the effects of that system, which since Chile’s return to democracy in 1990 has favoured domination by large blocs of parties, the scarce 5.21 percent of the vote won by the Communist Party indicates that “the left was incapable of presenting a convincing platform,” said Fazio.

“One of the limitations of Chile’s transition to democracy has been the weakness of the social movement, which has not yet recovered from the blow dealt by the dictatorship,” and that had repercussions on the outcome of the elections, Fazio told IPS.

“The social movement must be capable of moving forward independently of what is going on elsewhere. What is lacking in this country is a broad movement capable of creating new momentum,” the analyst added.

Another outcome of Sunday’s elections was a shift in strength within the ruling coalition. The Socialist Party and the Party for Democracy, the forces farthest to the left within the governing alliance, won 33 seats in the lower house, compared to the PDC’s 24.

In the Alliance for Chile, the UDI, with 35 deputies-elect, surpassed the more neo-liberal National Renovation party, which took 22 seats.

Despite the changes, Senator Alejandro Foxley of the PDC was upbeat regarding the possibility of accomplishing the goals that the Lagos administration has set itself.

“We are going to have a free trade accord with the United States, we will push through a bill on reforms of the health system that has been agreed in parliament, and we will give a boost to the economy,” he said.

But the UDI’s strength within the Alliance for Chile indicates that “moderation has been punished in these elections,” said former president Patricio Aylwin (1990-94), who leads the PDC. “The Christian Democracy Party is unhappy with the votes it has received,” he added.

Aylwin also pointed out that the proportion of support earned by the right was very similar to the 44 percent won by former dictator Pinochet in the plebiscite he lost in 1988, which ushered in democracy.

The parliamentary deputy who won the greatest number of votes, Guido Girardi of the Party for Democracy, expressed concern that “the UDI is eating up a more liberal right.”

He also stated that the candidates elected for his party would give “a new impulse to the progressive agenda, putting an emphasis on issues like social security and health reforms.”

President Lagos committed himself to working in the last four years of his term “for the growth of a better and safer Chile. Our government will continue fighting for a more just country, where society builds itself with greater solidarity.”

A majority of analysts agree, however, that there will no drastic changes in the government’s policies, but only a slight shake-up in the cabinet in January, which was announced months ago.

Meanwhile, Interior Minister José Miguel Insulza was sceptical with respect to the collaboration that Santiago Mayor Lavín, the leader of the UDI, offered the Lagos administration.

Insulza pointed to initiatives that the right had agreed to back in parliament, like a law on electoral spending, aimed at regulating the financing of political parties.

“Chile needs to take a series of fundamental economic steps. The country is practically in recession. It has suffered a collapse of international prices” of its exports, and “has a very weak social safety net. Policies are urgently needed, which is made clear by the fact that internal demand is not growing,” said Fazio.

“Public spending must increase. The government has followed policies that are no different than those of the dictatorship, and no major agreements have been forged with the business community,” the analyst concluded.

 
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