Since the morning of Tuesday 19th, all news have not stopped informing about the death of the ex President Patricio Aylwin. All the bourgeois media of this country has not stopped eulogizing Aylwin as the Big Statistician, the one that allowed the return of Democracy, and also developed a pacific transition from the military Dictatorship of Pinochet to the democracy we know today.
By Carlos Rozas.
What almost nobody said is that Aylwin himself was the one to provide the bases to perpetuate the neoliberal model in all its aspects, as he kept the Constitution of 1980, and deepened the economic model, with more privatizations; he also ensured impunity to those who committed abuse of Human Rights. In his own words, Democracy should include “civilians and militaries”, and justice should be made “as possible”.
As it is usual –so far-, there were only superficial changes. The turn administrators of the Chilean State, Frei Ruiz Tagle, Lagos, Bachelet and Piñera, have kept the same agenda. The Concertación (currently New Majority), together with the right represented by the Alliance for Chile (today Go Chile), have made sure of governing through agreements, only useful to the ones with power, of course, be them national business men or transnational companies that exploit the country.
For us, and for the History of the working people, his image will be remembered as the one of a dictator: the one who, colluded with the right, represented by Sergio Onofre Jarpa[1], from the National Party, and in alliance with the USA imperialism –led back then by Nixon and Kissinger-, made permanent complot to overthrow Salvador Allende’s government. It was not by chance Aylwin’s Minister of Defense was Patricio Rojas, the same who was in charge of the liaison relations with the dictator militaries during Allende’s turn.
Today, to most right-wing and pro-government politicians, Patricio Aylwin’s fits like a glove, as it is the President of the “National Reconciliation” who died, the President of the agreements. Chanting like sirens, they say the important thing is the positive work of politicians, and we should forget about the rancor, the corruption, the scandals. It is for this the government disposed the State Funeral.
Happily, the Chile of nowadays does not let them clean the face of the corrupt ones so fast. The surveys show the support to traditional politicians and their parties is on the ground. The same thing happens when it comes to trusting the Congress and Bachelet’s government. This has been exposed when the Students’ Movement (CONFEh) refused to change the date of today’s demonstration [April 21st] due to State Funeral. The students stated the struggle for their rights and against the false Education Reform of Bachelet is not up to negotiation, and the demonstration does not interfere with such ceremony.
We are advising the old politicians, the ones who mortgaged the workers’ struggles against the dictatorship through a National Pact; to those who promised a “joy” that never came, that there is a new generation of activists in every sector of this society, from the working class to the neighborhoods and the Students’ movement; a generation that does not carry the traumas of those who were defeated. And we, the ones who fought against the dictatorship and still stand up, we struggle together with them, and will continue to struggle for a better Chile, a socialist Chile. No negotiation will put us down to our knees in front of the powerful.
A democrat has passed? No! A dictator has passed. And if there is a heaven, we have no doubt he is there drinking tea, together with Pinochet and Contreras, talking about how well it turned the negotiated transition, and the model remains the same, with the Armed Forces intact, with no trial and no one guilty.
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Notes:
[1] Sergio Onofre Jarpa led, together with Patricio Aylwin, the CODE: a coalition that, during the government of Allende and the Popular Unity, insistently called the militaries to take action in name of the institutions. Then, Jarpa was Minister of Interior of Pinochet’s govnerment, and responsible for decreeing State of Siege in the Capital City and put the militaries out on the streets to repress the protests, causing hundreds of deaths. Later, the same Jarpa, together with Aylwin, led the national talks to avoid protests against the Dictator, and initiate a negotiated transition to democracy.
Translation: Sofía Ballack.
