Pinochet’s Policies Still Rankle in Chile
Pinochet’s Policies Still Rankle in Chile
By Marianela Jarroud
SANTIAGO, Sep 11 2013 (IPS) - Sept. 11, 1973 marked the start in Chile of a dictatorship that was synonymous with cruelty. But above and beyond the human rights violations, the reforms ushered in by the regime of General Augusto Pinochet continue to mark today’s Chile – a country of dynamic economic growth but a fragmented society.
Two of these reforms, in the spheres of politics and education, are among the targets of the massive student movement and sectors of the left, which are seeking to dismantle them and consider them key campaign issues for the November general elections.
“These are two essential areas, because they have an impact on the democratic character of Chilean society,” Pedro Milos, a history professor at the private Alberto Hurtado University, told IPS.
“The Chilean path to socialism” that the government of democratically elected Salvador Allende (1970-1973) attempted to follow before he was overthrown by Pinochet’s bloody coup, was systematically squelched by the dictator through a constitution that is still in effect today.
Ruling with an iron fist, Pinochet (1973-1990) introduced free-market policies, privatised and decentralised essential services that had been provided free of cost by the state, such as healthcare and education, and was a pioneer in putting pension funds in the hands of private companies.
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Chile: thousands mark 40th anniversary of coup
Submitted by Weekly News Update... on Tue, 09/17/2013 - 01:17 Southern Cone
Chile
Mapuche
police state
Tens of thousands of Chileans marched down the Alameda avenue in central Santiago on Sept. 8 in one of a series of events marking the 40th anniversary of the US-backed Sept. 11, 1973 coup that installed the military dictatorship headed by Gen. Augusto Pinochet Urgarte (1973-1990). The marchers, some carrying signs reading "40 years since the coup, nothing and no one is forgotten," demanded justice for the victims. The organizers said 60,000 people participated in the action, which is sponsored each year by the National Assembly for Human Rights, while the police put the number at 30,000. A confrontation broke out at the march’s end between agents of thecarabineros militarized police and masked protesters; 31 people were arrested and seven agents were injured, according to the police. (La Jornada, Mexico, Sept. 9, from AP, AFP)
The commemorations continued on the morning of Sept. 10 with an unusual protest called "Wanting Not to See" ("Querer No Ver"
: 1,210 people lay down for 11 minutes in a line stretching for blocks on the sidewalk along the Alameda from the Plaza Italia to the La Moneda presidential palace. The action was organized by actress and theater director María José Contreras as a reminder that approximately 1,200 people were disappeared under the dictatorship and are still not accounted for. On the same day former president Michelle Bachelet (2006-2010), the frontrunner in the Nov. 17 presidential election, visited the site of the Villa Grimaldi, a torture center where she was held with her mother, Angela Jeria, in 1974, after the death of her father, Socialist leader Alberto Bachelet. (Santiago Times, Sept. 10; LJ, Sept. 11, from correspondents and unidentified wire services)
On Sept. 11, the date of the coup, thousands of people attended the traditional ceremony near La Moneda during which floral tributes were placed at the statue of Salvador Allende Gossens, the Socialist president who was overthrown in the coup; Allende committed suicide as the military attacked the palace. Other Chileans marked the anniversary by setting up barricades in various sections of the capital; five vehicles were set on fire during protests in the communes that surround Santiago. The Secondary Students Coordinating Assembly (ACES) announced that students occupied seven high schools in the metropolitan area to honor the memory of students murdered under the dictatorship. The authorities said 13 people were arrested during the day in various incidents in Santiago, less than they had anticipated.
President Sebastián Piñera, the first rightwing politician to occupy La Moneda since the end of the dictatorship, used the anniversary to criticize politicians, judges and media that he said had been "complicit" during the Pinochet years, but he insisted that "the time has come, after 40 years, not to forget but to overcome the traumas of the past." According to a 2004 report by the National Commission on Political Imprisonment and Torture (known as the "Varech Commission" , at least 30,000 people were victimized under the dictatorship, with more than 28,000 of them subjected to illegal detention, torture, execution or disappearance; the report estimated that about 3,000 people were killed. (TeleSUR, Sept. 11; Clarín, Argentina, Sept. 12, from EFE, AFP, DPA)
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