Chilean New Constitution: Closing of Approve campaign gathers more than 500,000 people

On September 4, Chile will decide whether to approve or reject the proposal for a new constitution drafted by the Constituent Convention.

A few days before this transcendental vote, more than 500,000 people, according to the organization, gathered on the main avenue of Santiago to demonstrate strength in the face of the referendum.

Approve or reject is the issue that has all of Chile and the world expectant. For the first time in the history of the South American country, the vote will be with automatic registration and mandatory voting. That is why it is so difficult to predict its outcome.

The process that led to the drafting of the new constitutional text, which began on November 15, 2019, had an enormous weight of social mobilization, youth, women, human rights, and trade union movements, which pushed throughout the country the main changes to the current Constitution.

A few days before the end of the process, more than 500,000 people, according to the organization, gathered in the main avenue of Santiago.

Gustavo Gatica, who became one of the symbols of the repression of the government of Sebastián Piñera, after losing the sight of both eyes as a result of the actions of Carabineros (militarized police), told Sputnik that he feels “hopeful with the tremendous gathering in the Alameda and hopeful that this September 4 we will finally manage to change things”.

“And therein lies the importance of going to vote, I feel that there is a super-extensive road that has had everything, a lot of pain too, and this time on Sunday, September 4, we have the opportunity to finally realize all those changes that we have been seeking for a long time,” added the young man.

The deputy and one of the spokespersons for Approve x Chile, Vlado Mirosevic, told Sputnik that some people “a little older and with a little more history, told me that all this reminds them of the campaign of October 5, 1988, the campaign where the country said no to Pinochet”.

“That memory, which is in the memory of our elders, is an account of what today is also happening in another historic moment to end definitively with the legacy of the dictatorship, saying yes to a new constitutional text that was the product of what you can see here, it was the product of the people,” he concluded.

“APPROVE” BURNED ITS CARTRIDGES

The electoral campaign ended this Thursday, September 1, and the Approve Command x Chile took the opportunity to knock on the last door of its challenge of two million houses for the Approve, a territorial deployment that began on July 27 throughout the country to explain the proposal for a new constitution.

“We set out to reach at least two million houses throughout the country in this month of campaigning that remains. We are very convinced that this is a campaign that is going to be raised from the territories”, commented on that opportunity the deputy Karol Cariola, who assumed as coordinator of the command Approve x Chile.

“We have found houses where there are people with doubts, who do not know how they will vote, but in the conversation, they realize that in the new Constitution, there is an opportunity. That is why these 2,273,659 houses that have been visited and that have been added by the Approve fill us with pride, and we thank all Chilean men and women for having been part of this campaign that today closes”, said Cariola after knocking on the last door in the commune of Ñuñoa, in the east of Santiago.

But it was not only the more than two million doors knocked for the “Approve” vote that marked the campaign’s last day in the referendum’s run-up. During the night of August 31, and against all odds, former President Michelle Bachelet (2006 – 2010 and 2014 – 2018) participated in the television program supporting the constitutional proposal.

The audiovisual piece shows the former president’s visit to a group of women with whom she shares a snack and talks amicably about the proposed new Constitution.

“How do you think we women have been doing?” Bachelet asked them and then commented, “in the current Constitution, there is nothing about women, nothing at all”. Something different from the content of the new proposal where, as the former president emphasizes, “there are 35 articles that talk about women’s equality, equal pay because that still does not exist”.

Before saying goodbye, Michelle Bachelet calls to vote “Approve”, emphasizing to those who received her that “you from here and me from there (Geneva) are going to make history move forward because when women do things, history moves forward”.
According to the Electoral Service, next Sunday, September 4, Chile and the world will know if the proposed new Constitution is approved or rejected.

With information from Sputnik