The Mapuche women were chosen by Reil as the architect of the new Chilean constitution

By Aislinn Laingen

SANTIAGO (Reuters) – Delegates elected a woman on Sunday among Chile’s indigenous Mapuche majority to lead the country in drafting a new constitution – a huge change for a group not approved in the country’s current rulebook.

Elisa Loncon, 58, is an independent, professor at the University of Santiago and a Mapuche education and language rights activist. 96 of the 155 men and women, including 17 indigenous people, were elected members of the constitutional body that writes the new text to replace the previous magna carta of Chile created during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.

Loncon admitted with a clenched fist over his head, telling his colleagues to make noisy celebrations: “I greet the people of Chile from the north to Patagonia, from the sea to the mountains, to the islands, to all who see us today,” he said.

“We are grateful for the support of the various coalitions that put their trust and dreams in the hands of the Mapuche nation, the Mapuche people, the women, who voted to change the history of this country.”

His election was an important highlight, in which delegates were sworn in constantly after outside and outside protests, and clashes with police forced the event to be postponed.

The problems arose after the marches were presented by independent, leftist and indigenous groups delegates to the constitutional group, as well as other interest groups, who found barricades containing heavily armed police outside the old Santiago congress building where the event was taking place.

Representatives inside the event, along with the organizers, carried out harsh police tactics, beating drums and shouting over a classical youth orchestra playing the national anthem.

Among the requests for the withdrawal of special “repressive” police forces from the delegates, the head of the election tribunal presiding over the event agreed to suspend the event until noon.

Fracas stressed that there were major challenges in writing the new carta magna, against the backdrop of deep divisions that still erupt, after Chile began in October 2019 around inequality and elitism and was dismantled by massive protests sparked by a harsh police response.

The constitutional body was elected by popular vote in May and is dominated by independent and left-wing candidates, some with roots in the protest movement, with a smaller share of Conservative candidates backed by the current center-right government.

Delegates promised to address issues of water and property rights, independence of central banks and labor practices, creating a desire among investors to bring about changes that could lead to significant changes in the world’s top producer free market system.

Before the ceremony began, representatives of the Aymara and Mapuche performed spiritual ceremonies with singing and dancing in the streets of the center and on a nearby hill surrounding the new headquarters of the body.

Without acknowledging the current constitution, they hope that a new text will give nations new cultural, political and social rights.

The committee has one year to agree on a common rule, set up the committee and write a new text.

Leandro Lima, an analyst at Southern Control Risk Cone, said independents have brought “legitimacy” to the process because of deep distrust of Chilean policy, but little experience in politics and deep ideological divisions can cause serious delays in writing the text itself. .