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Gabriel Boric, the left-wing legislator who took the lead in protests against the government, has been elected the next president of Chile.
Nearly 99% of voters reported that Boric won 56% of the vote, compared to 44% of his Conservative opponent, Jose Antonio Caste.
Breaking from the polarizing rhetoric of the campaign into a model of civility, Kast immediately noticed the failure, tweeting a photo of himself on the phone congratulating his opponent on the “great victory”. Meanwhile, outgoing President Sebastian Pinera – a conservative millionaire – held a video conference with Boric to offer his government full support during the three-month transition.
“I will be the president of all Chileans,” Boric said in a brief televised appearance with Pine.
Boric’s victory is likely to be felt across Latin America, where ideological divisions have escalated amid the coronavirus pandemic, overturning a decade’s economic gains, exposing long-standing health care shortcomings and deepening inequalities.
At the age of 35, Boric will become the youngest modern president in Chile when he takes office in March.
He was one of several activists elected to the Chilean Congress in 2014 after leading protests in favor of higher education. Along the way, he vowed to “bury” and raise taxes on the neoliberal economic model left by General Augusto Pinochet’s 1973-1990 dictatorship and raise taxes on “super rich” to expand social services, fight inequality, and promote environmental protection.
Kast, who has a history of defending Chile’s past military dictatorship, was two points ahead of Boric in the first ballot last month, but failed to get a majority of votes. This led to a head-to-head elimination against Boric.
Boric was able to turn the tide by a larger margin than expected by pre-election opinion polls, extending beyond his headquarters in the capital Santiago and attracting non-political voters in rural areas. For example, in the northern region of Antofagasta, which finished third in the first round, Kast won by almost 20 points.
On Sunday, 1.2 million more Chileans voted compared to the first round, and turnout rose to almost 56%, the highest since voting ceased to be mandatory in 2012.
“We can’t help but be impressed by the historic turnout, the willingness of Kaste to accept and congratulate his opponent, even before the final results, and the generous words of President Pinera,” said Cynthia Arnson, head of the Latin American program. Wilson Center in Washington. “Chile’s democracy has won today, for sure.”
Kast, 55, a sympathetic Roman Catholic with nine children, came out of the far right after gaining less than 8% of the vote in 2017. Admirer of Brazil’s far-right president Jair Bolsonaro has risen steadily in opinion polls. playing with a divisive discourse that emphasizes conservative family values and the fears of Chileans that the rise of migration — from Haiti and Venezuela — is causing crime.
As a legislator, he has attacked the Chilean LGBTQ community and advocated more restrictive abortion laws. He has also accused outgoing President Sebastian Pinera, the Conservative, of betraying the economic legacy of General Augusto Pinochet, the country’s former military leader. The caste brother, Miguel, was one of Pinochet’s chief advisers.
“I am very calm,” said Monica Salinero, a teacher who joined the celebration of Boric’s victory in Piazza Italia in Santiago, Santiago, at the site of the 2019 protests.
In recent days, both candidates have tried to turn to the center.
“I’m not an extremist. “I don’t feel very right,” Kast said in the final whistle, despite revelations that his father was a German-born member of the German-born Adolf Hitler party.
Boric, backed by a coalition of left-wing parties including the Communist Party of Chile, brought more centrist advisers to his group and promised that the changes would be gradual and fiscally responsible.
“On both sides, people are voting out of fear,” Chilean political scientist Robert Funk of the University of Chile said before the vote count. “No party is particularly keen on its candidate, but if Kaste wins, they are voting for fear of an authoritarian recession, or because Boric is too young, inexperienced and afraid of joining the Communists.”
Boric’s victory is likely to be hampered by a split congress.
Moreover, political rules may soon change, as a newly elected convention is rewriting the country’s Pinochet-era constitution. The convention – the most powerful elected body in the nation – could in theory call for new presidential elections when it completes its work next year and if the new charter is ratified in a plebiscite.
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