Headlines, Human Rights, Latin America & the Caribbean

CHILE: Daughter of General Loyal to Allende Named Defence Minister

Gustavo González

SANTIAGO, Jan 9 2002 (IPS) - Michelle Bachelet, the daughter of a general who was loyal to Salvador Allende – the socialist president overthrown by General Augusto Pinochet’s 1973 coup – and who died of torture in prison became Chile’s first female defence minister Tuesday.

The designation of a woman defence minister is unprecedented in the Americas, and in the rest of the world, with the exception of Scandinavia, according to the public Chilean National Television.

The new minister, who up to Monday held the post of health minister, is the daughter of air force General Alberto Bachelet. Arrested after the Sep 11, 1973 military coup that overthrew the democratically elected government of Allende, General Bachelet died on Mar 12, 1974 in a Santiago prison.

In 1991, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission set up by the government reported that General Bachelet died “as a consequence of the torture and mistreatment suffered while he was in prison.”

General Bachelet, a constitutionalist officer, was secretary of the National Office of Supplies and Commercialisation during the government of the leftist Popular Unity coalition headed by Allende from 1970 to the 1973 coup d’etat.

Allende created that office to ensure supplies of basic goods to the population, in a vain attempt to counteract the speculation and hoarding of merchandise that contributed to the destabilisation of his government.

General Bachelet was one of the highest-profile victims of the “purge” carried out in the armed forces by the Pinochet dictatorship (1973-90), aimed at removing all of the officers and non-commissioned officers opposed to the coup.

His daughter Michelle, a militant member of the Socialist Party, received military honours Tuesday when she reached the Diego Portales building, the headquarters of the Defence Ministry, to take over the post from outgoing minister Mario Fernández, a christian democrat.

Socialist President Ricardo Lagos changed six cabinet ministers Monday, in a reshuffling announced since the legislative elections of Dec 16, in which the right-wing opposition chalked up significant advances.

Bachelet’s designation as minister of defence was the biggest surprise in the shuffle, the third carried out since Lagos took office on Mar 11, 2000.

The fact that Bachelet is a woman, a socialist and the daughter of a general who fell victim to the de facto regime gave rise to a variety of interpretations among political circles and the public of this Southern Cone country of 15 million.

Most analysts said Lagos was sending out a signal that civic- military relations in Chile have finally been completely normalised, making the exclusions and vetos of military promotions that characterised the Pinochet regime as well as the first years of the transition to democracy a thing of the past.

Since the end of the military regime, on Mar 11, 1990, defence ministers have come from the ranks of the Christian Democrat Party, the most moderate and centrist force in the Coalition for Democracy, which is also made up of socialists and social democrats, and which has governed the country since 1990.

The last socialist minister of defence was Orlando Letelier, who also served as foreign minister under the Allende administration. Letelier was killed in September 1976 in Washington by the dictatorship’s secret police.

Bachelet is a pediatrician trained at the universities of Chile and Von Humboldt in Berlin.

She also took courses in public health and epidemiology in Chile, France and the United States, studied political science, strategy and tactics at the National Academy of Political Studies, which comes under the jurisdiction of the Chilean armed forces, and earned a graduate degree at Fort Leslie J. McNair at the National Defence University in the United States.

She served as adviser to previous defence ministers, and is considered highly qualified for her new position, according to military sources.

The conservative daily El Mercurio noted that Bachelet is on very good terms with army commander General Ricardo Izurieta, as well as General Juan Emilio Cheyre, who will replace Izurieta next March.

“The designation (of a minister) is the exclusive authority of the president, and a designation by the president is not criticised and cannot cause surprise,” air force commander General Patricio Ríos said Tuesday.

“Within the air force there is no sense of surprise (over the naming of Bachelet), and there will be no difficulty at all due to the fact that the person designated is a woman,” said the officer.

For her part, Bachelet said she was “familiar with the codes and the military way of life from the cradle, and on the other hand I have studies, work and experience in this area.”

Bachelet ruled out any possibility of opposition in the armed forces due to the fact that she is a woman, and said that all of the branches of the armed forces would accept her authority, thanks to the professionalisation of the armed forces that has taken place since the restoration of democracy.

With the exception of the navy, all of the branches of the armed forces have women officers and non-commissioned officers, including two female generals in the Carabineros militarised police.

Bachelet said she hoped to continue forging new spaces for the participation of women from her post in the Defence Ministry, pointing out that “contacts” have been made with the navy to that respect.

Meanwhile, the public’s reactions to the naming of a female defence minister have varied.

“It is a lack of respect towards the country, and especially towards the armed forces,” said Alvaro Covarrubias, a retired member of the military.

“The designation of Bachelet was excellent. For those who do not know her, she has studies and a wide knowledge of defence questions,” said university professor Marjorie Rodríguez.

“Administrative capacity is not based on gender, but on the skills and expertise of each person, and for that reason I believe that of course a woman can be minister of defence or of any other portfolio,” said Carlos Abarzúa.

According to Nelson Cabello, a university student, naming Bachelet to the Defence Ministry was “a stroke of genius” on the part of Lagos.

“A woman in that post sends a very strong message to the ‘miliqueria’ (a derogatory term for the military), especially when the woman who has been designated is the daughter of an honorable military man who was betrayed, tortured and murdered by the Pinochet gang.”

 
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