To my readers, I would like to tell you that it wasn’t in my plans to talk about the chaotic situation that has been going on in my country since last Friday.  But as a Chilean leaving outside the country, for me it is impossible to ignore the huge manifestation of protests.

What’s the issue

The issue is about the discontent of: 

-The increase of the electricity, gas and medication

-The deficiency in our public health care. 

-The incredible discrepancy between the salary of the elected members of the government and the citizens.

-The poor salaries, low pensions for our retirees.

-Tolls in highways (one or two between city to city) on top of that Chileans pay an annual fee for a circulation permit to drive.

-The collusion from similar businesses.

-The corruption and fraud from the police and military.

-The words of the minister of economy who said “If you want to pay less for the transportation get earlier to go to work” talking about the different fairs of transportation depending on the hour of the day (during rush hour the fare is more expensive).

-The minister of finance who said “not everything in Chile got more expensive, flowers got cheaper, if you are a romantic buy some flowers for your partners.”

-The President said that the country was in war when talking about the current manifestations before sending the police and after the military to the streets.

-Police brutality against students protesting.

All the above and probably some more, exploded after the public transportation fare went up 30 Chilean pesos that equals 0.054 cents of a Canadian dollar, which sounds like nothing but for my country it is a huge thing. I should mention that in Chile by law the price of the transportation must be increased several times per year without taking into consideration the price of the oil. The reason behind this increase is that the subway (owned and controlled by the government) subsidize the Transantiago which are buses that connects the city and the subway are owned by the private sector. 

To put you all in context the minimum wage in Chile is around $540 CAD* a month, (depending on the dollar price at the moment) and the average cost of the use of the subway, twice a day for a month is about $100 CAD (98.80) so ⅕ of the salary (this is one person one salary) goes to getting you from your home to your work and vice versa,  if you go somewhere else you’ll expend more. Our retirees have pensions of $323.85 CAD , almost half of the minimum wage but the do have a discount on the transportation fare. 

*CAD= Canadian Dollars

Domino effect of the issue

Due to the above and because most of the parents work, students (which also pay less transportation fare), they decide to protest about the increase of the transportation on behalf of their parents. The way of the protest was with a mass evasion of the subway fare, they opened the gates for the rest of the users of the subway so they could get there for free in many subway stations. 

This action itself was partially responsible for what was triggered later on.

Many criminals and antisocials took advantage of what the students started in good faith and transform it into chaos when they started destroying and burning subway platforms and many other things. 

That was the moment that the president of Chile using one of his attributions and due to the ongoing confrontation between students, parents, and Carabineros de Chile (which is the name of our police officers) and the lack of government leadership, he called for the “National Security Law.” 

I must tell you that the General in charge of the military in Santiago, wasn’t happy to deploy his troops to the streets, he was very clear on his comments on TV. He didn’t want to be in this situation but he had to follow the order of the Commander in Chief of the armed forces (the President of Chile) adding to that he said that their forces duties were to safe life and take care of the people Chile and at the same time he would implacable against the criminals that are causing or trying to cause harm and chaos.

* I would like to remind you that soldiers are trained to fight a war and not to calm nor eased the discontent of the citizens of a country.*

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Consequences

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The actions of the president of Chile cause something like a Volcanic eruption. The lava was distributed throughout the whole country and in every direction. 

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Every action has a reaction  

With Carabineros and the military on the street, the executive power failed stopping the protest countrywide. Their actions were like throwing gasoline on a huge fire. The movement grew up considerably, thousands of people marched pacifically in every town and city in the country. The people protest in the form of a “Cacerolazo”( people making noise by banging pots, pans, and other utensils in order to call for attention). 

Due to this massive anti government reaction from my country fellows, the government of Chile (Executive Power) add to the “National Security Law” a curfew from 10 pm to 6 am, that has been changing every day to an earlier starting time.

The consequences of this government action has been a complete failure. The reaction of the people has been against the government of Chile, very unusual for a country that has been in democracy for the last 30 years. 

NOTE: What you are going to read in the next paragraph, will be up to you to decide which information is true and which information is false. Remember, every coin has two sides.

Reaction

Like I explained to you, every government decision in this situation has been a complete failure.

Do you think that with the military and police forces on the streets, the problem was  solved or the pain was eased?. 

The answer is “NO!.” Everything listed below… 

1.-The disagreements.

2.-The abuses from police and army.

3.-The verbal attack to the authorities from the people of Chile.

4.-The looting.

5.-The fires mostly causes to big corporation.

6.- The unsolved murders. 

7.-The declassified torture.

8.-The disappearance of citizens.

 …the injuries from both sides which has increased drastically. 

Both sides blame each other. There have been situations where hundreds of people were waiting for the opportunity to raid supermarkets and malls and loot everything that they find on their path. It is quite strange to me that “NO” police nor military forces, only media channels has been present in these events.

The police and military, they just show up after the crime or the loot has been committed, that is what you see on the TV.

On social media, citizens has posted videos where Carabineros (military and other forced too but less frequent) is doing exactly the same thing that the delinquents are doing to the private business and they have even started fires in some buildings. 

I want to make it clear, as everyone knows, that I am out of the country and all this information is what I get directly from my friends, TV and social media.

I want to make it clear that I truly believe that a lot of information can be manipulated!.

From the bottom of my heart I honestly hope that people stop lying about the information that has been distributed around the world.

Politics

The world should know that the salaries of the legislative, the executive and the judicial power are double or higher than the ones in Canada or the U.S..

Since the movement has started 8 days ago, brought an incredible change in the politics of Chile.  What wasn’t done in 30 years keeping the country in poverty is trying to be resolved in record time: “Less than two weeks”. 

1) Medication: the prizes has been frozen, the taxes has been eliminated and will drop 30% of their prices next Monday.

2) Medical insurance: Medication that are unaffordable for the working class will be paid by the government with the money of the people that earns more than 8,000,000 of Chilean pesos around $14,393 CAD per month.

3) Transportation: The Increase of the transportation fare was eliminated immediately.

4) Parliament: Salary of members of the government has been drop 30% and will be dropped to 50% and on top of that they are reducing the number of members from 180 to 120.

5) Per Diem: Which is the money that members of parliament received for government “business” expenses will be reduced to 50%.

6) Solidarity pensions: has been increases 20%.

7) AFP: They are the controllers of the pensions of the Chilean people. Pensions are being reviewed and at this moment they are discussing of what percent of the pension should be increased.

8) Minimum wage: The Legislative power want a minimum of an 18% percent increase in the minimum wage but the government hasn’t reach an agreement yet. Some members want the minimum wage of $925 CAD approx.

Some businessmen are lobbying to increase the salary of their employees to $925 CAD minimum effective immediately at the same time requesting the government of Chile to resolve all the issue in question.   

9) The Chilean people is asking for the resignation of the president and all the family members that he has in the government, including his cousin who is the vice president.

10) The people of Chile is requesting that no member of the government can give a job to a family member or relative, what is a habit that Chile has for the last 30 year, since we got our democracy back. Sometimes those relatives don’t even have a relevant degree of the position of power that they are placed in or they don’t even have labour experience at all as these people get paid twenty times the minimum wage.

Even after all the action imposed by our President to the Congress, people keep manifesting due to all the above has not been approved (except for transportation) they are not a law and had not been signed by the President of Chile. The reason behind is because of the lack of credibility that we all have about our politicians.  

 

My opinion 

The system is broken… and it has been broken for the past 30 years and maybe more. 

If our institutions and leaders give us the wrong example, how can they expect us to act differently?. If you are in the top of the chain they have to act as ethically as possible and the point of comparison is from an ideal point of view. I know for a fact that there are great politicians, police officers and soldiers but there are also horrible politicians that always put their own interests first.

Carabineros and soldiers that has been framing people for their own crimes, hiding tortures and murders and also stole millions of dollars from the people. 

I wish to avoid this problem in the near future to go back to the old system where the vote would be mandatory. In that way no one would be able to say “It’s not my fault”.

 That’s why I think that the system is broken,because all what we have today in Chile, have been built in the most unequal society of all, based on lies, omissions and a systemic corruption that has spread its tentacles everywhere.

Understand that the people always imitate the example of their leaders.

-If there is evasion above, there will be below. 

-If there is injustice above, there will be below.

-If there is crime above, there will be below. 

-If there was only one example of a moral leader who was foolproof, the people would be virtuous and what happened would not happen. 

To be honest it is ridiculous to try to hide the truth in today’s world, where everybody with their cellphones and social media, can access the information quicker than ever before, but it is also the time that the information can be as malleable as ever when not given all the facts, since people sometimes show only one side of the issue, the one that benefits them the most.  

Understanding this is crucial for the future of Chile and the destiny of South America. 

I hope that today’s posts help you to inform you about what is going on in Chile, I hope to write next time with a less controversial topic, have a great weekend and write you next time.