CHILE: Citizens Movement Calls for New Constitution

By Daniela Estrada Reprint | | Print |

Daniela Estrada

SANTIAGO, Dec 20 2005 (IPS) - With under a month to go before the runoff vote to elect a new president, Chilean civil society organisations are studying the viability of holding a constituent assembly to draft a replacement for the country’s current constitution, which was adopted in 1980 under dictator Augusto Pinochet.

“Pinochet’s constitution is congenitally deformed,” Paulina Weber of the Movement for the Emancipation of Chilean Women told IPS.

Weber’s organisation is working to promote a massive civil society mobilisation aimed at demanding the adoption of a new constitution. One of its first steps towards this goal was the organisation of a seminar that brought together representatives of a wide range of non-governmental groups, and particularly women’s rights organisations.

The proposals put forward include the establishment of a proportional representation system for the federal congress, mechanisms for greater popular participation and decision-making, the creation of an ombudsman’s office and recognition of the country’s indigenous peoples, among other reforms.

Citizens’ Pact for the Constitution We Want, the seminar organised last week in Santiago, was also attended by respected jurists who detailed the weaknesses of the current Chilean constitution.

The meeting was held three days after the Dec. 11 elections, in which socialist Michelle Bachelet, the candidate for the ruling centre-left coalition, took close to 46 percent of the votes, followed by moderate right-wing businessman, with just over 25 percent. Despite her commanding lead, Bachelet did not capture the absolute majority needed to win in the first round of voting, and will now face off against Piñera in a runoff vote Jan. 15.

According to the participants in the forum, the constitution in force since 1980 is illegitimate, since it was drafted by the military dictatorship headed by Pinochet and ratified in a referendum of questionable validity.

Since Pinochet’s defeat in a 1988 plebiscite measuring support for the dictatorship, the Chilean constitution adopted by his regime has been reformed 17 times. The latest and most significant modifications, promoted by the Ricardo Lagos administration and approved by Congress in July of this year, were aimed at erasing the “authoritarian enclaves” created by the dictatorship to ensure continued political power on the part of the armed forces even after civilian government was restored.

The most recent reform eliminated the posts of designated senators (of whom four were members of the military) and senators for life, and granted the president the authority to fire the commanders of the armed forces and the Carabineros (militarised police). It also shortened the presidential term from six years to four.

However, the new modifications did not abolish one of the most loudly criticised provisions of the constitution adopted by the Pinochet regime: the “binomial” electoral system, through which two senators and two deputies are elected for each constituency and district. The system is considered undemocratic because it benefits the large coalitions and leaves smaller minority parties without representation.

In the opinion of Francisco Zúñiga, a constitutional lawyer from the University of Chile, this year’s amendments did not result in a “new constitution,” as Lagos declared on Sept. 17, the day he signed them into effect.

“The reform was undertaken behind closed doors. There was no public debate. At most, it was discussed among academics and in specialised publications,” said Zúñiga.

The participants in the seminar advocated the adoption of a proportional representation system, which would allow parties from the entire political spectrum to win seats in the legislature.

They also called for constitutional recognition of Chile’s indigenous peoples and a guarantee of economic, social and cultural rights.

Other proposals included the creation of a people’s defender or ombudsman, the incorporation into the constitution of international agreements and conventions signed by Chile, and the establishment of mechanisms for direct citizen participation in political power, such as referendums, plebiscites, and means for the general public to propose new laws and recall authorities.

Zúñiga maintained that a new constitution should modify the “heart” of the Pinochet constitution, namely the free-market neoliberal development model that his regime established in Chile.

For her part, Ximena Valdés, director of the Centre for Women’s Studies, believes it is crucial for the constitution to reflect the changes undergone in Chilean families in recent decades, particularly the boom in the number of single-parent families – primarily headed by women – and the massive entry of women into the paid workforce.

Civil society activists are encouraged by the results of the legislative elections also held Dec. 11, as the ruling centre-left coalition now holds a majority in both houses of Congress for the first time.

The coalition that has ruled Chile since democracy was restored in 1990 – made up of the Christian Democratic Party (PDC), the Socialist Party (PS), the Party for Democracy (PPD) and the Radical Social Democratic Party (PRSD) – has been opposed to the Pinochet constitution from the very start and repeatedly announced its intention to replace or radically reform it. Until now, it has lacked the congressional majority needed to push through these changes.

The Dec. 11 elections decided 20 of the 38 seats in the Senate and all 120 seats in the Chamber of Deputies. The ruling coalition captured 52 percent of the votes against 39 percent for the right-wing opposition alliance.

Lawyer Eric Palma, a representative of the non-governmental Chile a la Carta Movement for a Constituent Assembly, told IPS that “thanks to the recent election of deputies and senators from the PS and PPD, which are characterised by their commitment to citizens’ rights, there is greater hope of constitutional reform now than ever before.”

Within the governing coalition, the more left-leaning branch represented by these two parties now has a larger number of seats in Congress, while the more centrist PDC has fewer members than before in both houses.

According to Palma, one of the challenges facing social organisations is to demonstrate that the constitution is not merely a political issue, but rather one that affects people’s daily lives.

“Within the constitution there are political practices that translate into the mistreatment of individuals. Therefore, if our proposal is to be successful, we will need to define the constituent assembly as a space for coming together, one of fraternity, joy, affection, solidarity, camaraderie, love, essentially, respect for others,” he said.

Chile a la Carta is made up primarily of lawyers and law students from throughout the country, and was founded three years ago to promote public debate on the issue of a constituent assembly.

On Nov. 18 and 19, the group organised a symbolic plebiscite in the Chilean capital to gauge public opinion on the matter. A total of 1,351 people cast their votes in the mock ballot box set up in downtown Santiago, and 97.7 percent were in favour of a constituent assembly.

The president of the Movement for Consultation and Citizens’ Rights, Edgardo Condeza, put particular emphasis on the implementation of referendums and plebiscites, since these already exist in “numerous countries today, including Uruguay, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia, Mexico, Brazil and Venezuela,” he told IPS.

Condeza’s group has organised symbolic referendums in 30 municipalities around the country. One was held in 2000 in the region of Bío-Bío, 500 km south of Santiago, to measure public opinion on the privatisation of drinking water.

A full 99 percent of the 136,783 people who cast votes were opposed to privatisation of this service, which was carried out by the authorities irregardless.

Civil society groups believe that the deadline for organising a constituent assembly and drafting a new constitution should be 2010, the year that Chile celebrates the bicentennial anniversary of its independence from Spain.