Activists, politicians and TV hosts jostle to rewrite Chile's constitution
May 14, 2021
9:17 AM CDT
Americas
Aislinn Laing]
6 minute read
On a crisp spring day in 2019, Cote Cumplido took up a banner and joined more than a million people marching through the streets of the Chilean capital Santiago to demand greater equality and major changes to its political system.
Now the 33-year-old is handing out flyers with her own name on them on, hoping to be elected this weekend to a body of representatives who will over the next year lead an historic rewrite of the Andean country's constitution.
"Those protests were like an avalanche, the expression of a fury that built up over years at the neoliberal system," said Cumplido, a historian at Chile's National Library who describes herself as a feminist and says she wants greater citizen representation in politics.
"We need to deepen democracy, make it more agile, more in tune with what's happening today and that has really driven my conviction that we need a new constitution."
On Saturday and Sunday, Chileans will vote to pick 155 constitutional assembly members to draft a new constitution to replace Chile's charter, which was drafted during the 1973-1990 dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.
More:
https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/activists-politicians-tv-hosts-jostle-rewrite-chiles-constitution-2021-05-14/
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Chileans will choose members who will draw up a new constitution as well as state and local officials in elections.
Indigenous Mapuche candidate Juana Millal plays a kultrun drum while campaigning in Santiago, Chile. Chileans will vote on May 15 and 16 to elect members who will draft a new constitution [Esteban Felix/AP Photo]
14 May 2021
Santiago, Chile – On a sunny winter’s day in Chile’s capital, a group of neighbours in La Reina, a county on Santiago’s east side, gathered to support the candidates for the Constitutional Convention, days before what could be the country’s most important election ever. In good spirits, they waved flags, laughed and greeted each other with their elbows. They wore masks and shared alcohol gel.
Renato Garrido, one of the candidates, urged people to vote because, he said: “A new constitution will be the only way our country can have participation, justice, true freedom and growth. When the citizens feel they are being heard they can reach agreements, with respect and tolerance for all opinions. We must do this out of our love for Chile.”
On May 15 and 16, Chileans will go to the polls to elect 155 members of the Constitutional Convention. Its mission will be the writing of a new constitution which should be submitted to a referendum in 2022. After a long struggle, the current constitution – written in the ’80s under the Pinochet dictatorship and much amended in the years since – will be left aside.
More than 1,300 candidates will compete to become members of the Constitutional Convention. For the first time, this election includes a gender parity requirement – giving women a proportional number of seats, and will include 17 reserved spaces for Indigenous people.
More:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/5/14/what-is-at-stake-in-chiles-upcoming-elections