Karol Cariola—37, a midwife and former president of the Federation of Students of the University of Concepción (a major industrial town and port in central Chile) and former general secretary of the Young Communist League, is highly popular in the political arena of Chile. Her election was hailed by the people of all party shades, especially by the women and the youth.

“Today, we have shown the willingness to build, despite our diversity and differences, a common position in the leadership of the Chamber of Deputies,” the jubilant Cariola said. “I call on the opposition to collaborate for the development of the country,” Cariola emphasized, “to abandon the calls to weaken the Boric government, to abandon the calls to bog down the debates about public policies that Chileans urgently require. “We will represent the diversity of this parliament, and we’ll be open to listen, dialogue, and work with all forces, and collaborate with the government of President Gabriel Boric”, she said.

The Chilean Communist leader said “We are also willing to listen to and incorporate all ideas and proposals that contribute to the advancement of the country as a whole, the welfare of our homeland, the welfare of its people from Arica to Punta Arenas, and from the sea to the mountains.” Cariola observed: “Chile does not stand still, and neither do we; we are moving forward, and this office will be supportive of all the advances that are so necessary at this very moment in time.”

Till now, the left wing coalition led by President Boric had faced lot of hurdles in getting approval of the government’s pro people programmes due to the opposition of the rightwing majority in the chamber of deputies. If the latest voting figure indicates the positioning of the parties in the chamber in favour of the Left, Boric government can now go ahead with its programmes with highly popular Cariola acting as the new president of the chamber. Out of 155 seats in the chamber, the Communist Party along with its small allies has a strength of 16 but its influence on the Boric government is much more compared to its chamber strength.

Chile has been working toward a new constitution since massive demonstrations in 2019 called for reform. In 2022, voters rejected a draft written by a constitutional convention, and in 2023, they rejected a new draft developed by a constitutional council. President Gabriel Boric said his administration would not attempt to develop another draft.

Chile has a robust economy but its level of inequality is also high. Boric presidency is taking measures to improve the living conditions of the people belonging to the vulnerable sections of Chile. Crime is a major concern in Chile like other Latin American nations. The left wing regime has taken some new measures to bring down the crime rate. Some measures have been taken to break the traditional gangs backed by the drug mafias. President Boric has consistently promoted human rights abroad, regardless of the political ideology of the government committing the abuses.

Massive protests over deficiencies in the provision of public services, an increase in the price of public transportation, and economic inequality erupted across Chile in October 2019. Police used excessive force against demonstrators and bystanders. As an “institutional exit” from the crisis, political parties agreed to consult the citizenry on steps toward a new constitution.

In 2020, Chileans voted overwhelmingly to establish a convention to write the new constitution. However, in September 2022, almost 62 percent of voters rejected the convention’s draft. In December 2022, political parties agreed to a new drafting process.

In January 2023, Congress created an expert commission to work on a new draft that was reviewed by a constitutional council with a conservative majority, which was elected by voters. The draft advanced the protection of environmental and some other rights but also included a broad right to conscientious objection that could be abused to deny access to certain human rights and provided for the expulsion of migrants with irregular status “as soon as possible.”

Chilean Communist Party has always been fighting for expansion of women rights in the country. Chile’s 28-year total abortion ban ended in 2017, when the Constitutional Court upheld a law decriminalizing abortion when the life of a pregnant woman is at risk, the foetus is non-viable, or the pregnancy resulted from rape. Official statistics show that 831 people received legal abortions in 2022, and 407 did between January and September 2023.

Chile’s abortion law, as interpreted by a constitutional court decision, includes an overly broad exception for healthcare providers—individuals, companies, and institutions—to refuse to perform abortions based on conscientious objection. More than 40 percent of public health obstetricians were registered as conscientious objectors in 2022 and refused to perform abortions in cases of rape. Registered as conscientious objectors, six entire private hospitals and clinics refuse to perform any abortions, and a seventh health facility only performs them in cases of rape.

On March 8, International Women’s Day, Chile ratified the International Labour Organization (ILO) Violence and Harassment Convention (C190), which establishes state obligations to protect women from violence and harassment in the workforce.

Chile commemorated the 50th anniversary of the 1973 coup against former President Salvador Allende, amid high polarization about those events. President Boric, along with all living former presidents, signed a commitment to promote and defend human rights “regardless of political ideology.” All political parties in the Senate supported a declaration on the promotion of democracy and human rights while acknowledging the impossibility of a “common vision of history.”

In June, President Boric created an expert commission to work on land rights solutions and reparations for Mapuche communities, which is expected to issue a report by the second half of 2024.

The state of emergency that President Boric declared in May 2022 in four provinces of southern Chile with a significant Mapuche population, citing increasing violence and roadblocks, continued as of October, with repeated congressional approval. Rural violence in that region diminished 11 percent from January through August, compared to the same period in 2022, while the number of arrests increased fourfold, the government reported.

The prison population increased more than 18 percent in a year, surpassing 51,000 people as of September 2023, about 25 percent above facilities’ capacity. In May, the Justice Ministry warned that the “congestion” represented a challenge to infrastructure and penitentiary personnel capacities.

President Boric has consistently criticized human rights abuses in other countries—including El Salvador, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba—regardless of the political ideology of the governments. In September, he denounced a crackdown by the “dictatorial regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo in Nicaragua, where critics are banned from participating in elections, persecuted, their nationalities taken, their houses searched, and their political rights taken.”

As a member of the UN Human Rights Council, Chile supported scrutiny of various states’ human rights records in 2023. It voted in favour of a resolution extending the mandates of groups of UN experts investigating systematic rights violations in Nicaragua and Syria, and of the special rapporteurs on the human rights situations in Russia, Iran, and Belarus.

In January, Chile joined Colombia in requesting an advisory opinion from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights on states’ human rights obligations in responding to the climate emergency, including its varied impact on regions and particular population groups. Chilean left wing government is now determined to make use of its thin majority in the chambers to go ahead with transformation programme. (IPA Service)