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 Editorials | January 2006 
Break in Chile
 Serge Truffaut - Le Devoir
The first woman elected president of Chile, a country reputed to be the most macho on the continent, Michelle Bachelet will be able to conduct intended reforms with more latitude than her predecessors. By according a fourth consecutive term to "Democratic Cooperation," a center-left coalition, Chileans have confirmed the results of the legislative elections held last December. In a word, the center-left holds the majority of seats in the Senate and in the Parliament - in addition, obviously, to retaining the Presidency.
Consequently, the new president will no longer be confronted with Houses that - while they were dominated by the right - took malicious pleasure in torpedoing proposed laws. The legislative menu outlined during the electoral campaign suggests the introduction of changes on every front. From the creation of Environment, Health, and Education Ministries, we must expect the establishment of markers designed to satisfy the center-left's electoral base, but which will more than a little irritate the Chilean elite.
In fact, the latter will be called upon to unloosen its purse strings once the retirement regime designed by the Bachelet cabinet is implemented. The new government obstinately insists that entrepreneurs contribute to this program so that Chileans are no longer condemned - if one dares say so - to poverty the day they stop working.
In this regard, we must note that Chilean society remains very unequal. Around 15% of the population holds 50% of the country's wealth. If it is true that Chile is the South American example par excellence of economic growth (close to 6% a year since the return of democracy 16 years ago), the distribution of the related gains - in contrast - leaves much to be desired. And Bachelet has promised to change that.
In that undertaking, the president will be able to make use of a significant change observed in the country's political culture. According to students of the Chilean scene, for the first time since 1990, Pinochet's shadow was not looming over the political horizon. To such an extent that the discomfiture of the dictator's heirs, regrouped within the "Independent Democratic Union," is deemed emblematic of that phenomenon.
This rejection of the last fingerprints left by Pinochet is the sign, according to some, of a definitive rupture with the past. In fact, between the majorities held in the Senate and the Assembly and the erasure of everything that more or less recalls the dictatorial regime, Bachelet should be in a position to lead the country without too much hindrance.
Translation: t r u t h o u t French language correspondent Leslie Thatcher. |
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