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Chile - 2021 General Election

General elections are expected to be held in Chile on 21 November 2021. Aside from the presidential election, voters will also 27 of 50 members of the Senate and the entire 155 members of the Chamber of Deputies. The National Congress is Bicameral. The Chamber of Deputies is formed with 155 directly elected members, who are appointed for 4 years. The Senate is made up of 50 directly elected members, who are appointed for 8 years, but half of its members are renewed every 4 years. The new electoral system for parliamentary elections, with the end of the binominal system, came into force from 2017. Although the governing coalition, Let's Go Chile, held slim majorities in both houses in the current legislative session, its bloc suffered a setback in May 2021 when it failed to secure a third of seats in the Constituent Assembly that was debating and drafting a new Constitution.

Stability in Chile disappeared in 2019, in an explosion of massive and sometimes violent protests. Politicians seemed unable to deal with slower economic growth and narrowing opportunities, especially for younger people. Independent and leftist candidates gained ground in the May 2021 vote for mayors, local councils, governors, and constitutional convention representatives.

A convention to write a new constitution calmed the protests and seemed to offer a peaceful solution to these grievances. The vote for the constitutional convention in May 2021 (in which only 43% turned out) saw support surge for the hard left while drying up for mainstream parties. As a result, the critics charged that convention became a theater of wokeness. The future president of Chile will have to implement the changes emanating from the new Constitution, which began to be drafted in July and will be subject to approval by plebiscite in 2022.

Chile's Constituent Convention (CC) resulting from the May elections wasa formed by 79 women and 76 men. Their average age is 45. Independent representatives obtained 103 seats, thus securing a majority. At least two out of five Chileans opted for candidates who did not run in any of the three major alliances conformed by the traditional parties. Local outlet La Tercera surveyed 132 elected members. At least 86.8 percent of them support the reduction of presidential powers, 51 percent vow for a unicameral Parliament, and 65 percent agree to reform the Constitutional Court. Furthermore, 91.6 percent of the elected representative would include water access, protection, and distribution as a fundamental right and a national public good in the Constitution. In terms of social rights, 69 percent of the politicians interviewed also stated that the State should guarantee universal access to decent housing. On equal rights issues, 73 percent of the CC members concur to an equal salary between men and women, and the declaration of Chile as a plurinational state.

On July 18, millions of Chileans went to polling stations to elect presidential candidates from the Go Chile and Approve Dignity coalitions who will compete in the November 21 elections. The Approve Dignity alliance comprises the Social Green Regionalist Federation, the Commons, Democratic Revolution, Social Convergence, and Communist parties. This leftist alliance proposes two candidates: Gabriel Boric and Daniel Jadue. The Go Chile alliance comprises the National Renovation, Political Evolution, Independent Democratic Union and Democratic Regionalist parties, and one independent candidacy. In this conservative coalition, four politicians compete: Joaquin Lavin, Ignacio Briones, Sebastian Sichel, and Mario Desbordes.

The Chilean presidential primary elections produced results that opinion polls had not predicted. Citizens elected independent politician Sebastian Sichel as the candidate of the "Let's Go Chile" coalition of right-wing parties and former student leader Gabriel Boric as the candidate in the "Approve Dignity" coalition of left-wing organizations. With 49 percent of the vote, Sichel defeated former Mayor Joaquin Lavin, Mario Desbordes (National Renovation party) and Ignacio Briones (Evopoli party). Sichel was Social Development Minister in 2018 and president of the State Bank until December 2020. According to local political analysts, the triumph of Sichel and Boric evidences the existence of a generational change in Chilean politics, as neither of the two pre-candidates were born at the time of the 1973 coup d'état. When the March 2022 inauguration rolls around, polling frontrunner Boric could become Chile's youngest president ever at 36 years old. Sichel, at 44 years, would be the youngest in 170 years. Presidents in Chile serve four-year terms. On 24 August 2021, the Chilean Electoral Service (SERVEL) announced that nine politicians would be candidates for the Nov. 21 presidential elections. Prior to the elcton itself, polls all indicated two clear frontrunners: on the left and far-right. Gabriel Boric, a 35-year-old congressman and former student movement leader, represents the left-wing Apruebo Dignidad coalition, while Jose Antonio Kast, a 55-year-old lawyer and former congressman, is the far-right candidate of the Christian Social Front coalition.

1. Jose Antonio Kast, of the Chilean Republican Party, will stand for the Christian Social Front coalition, a nationalist, anti-immigrant and socially conservative bloc, which registered its candidate Kast in late August. Kast's CV includes a law degree from and academic work at the Catholic University of Chile and time as a city councilman and later representative in Congress for the city of Buin. He came in fourth in the 2017 presidential election with 7.9 percent of the vote. His most prominent proposals include strong support for security forces, particularly following the 2019 social protests, and stricter immigration policies. Kast, 55, opposed the movement to rewrite the Constitution. On the political spectrum, he falls farther to the right than Sichel and has gone as far as defending the Pinochet dictatorship by saying that on the day of the 1973 coup, Chileans "chose liberty." Kast’s tough stance on crime has wide appeal. He has hardline positions against immigration, LGBTQ rights, and reproductive rights, and some of his other views have generated substantial alarm. He has advocated for persecution of the left and for executive power to pre-emptively detain “agitators” in unknown locations if needed to avoid social unrest in the future.
2. Gabriel Boric, the election favorite, was the candidate for the left-wing Apruebo Dignidad coalition, of the Social Convergence party, who beat out popular candidate Daniel Jadue of the Communist Party of Chile in the country's primary elections on July 18. Besides promoting feminist and environmentalist demands, Boric pledged to change the current economic and social model. Though polls put Daniel Jadue in the lead for the Approve Dignity primary, Boric bested the popular Recoleta mayor and Communist Party member. The Apruebo Dignidad leftist coalition decided its presidential candidate in the publicly-funded primaries held nationwide on July 18, 2021, which was won by lawmaker Gabriel Boric by 60% of the vote. Boric first rose to prominence as a leader of Chile's 2011 student protests, a movement that sought free university tuition and drew attention to inequality in Chilean higher education. In 2013, he was elected as an independent to represent the Magallanes and Antarctic regions in Chile's lower house of Congress as the only candidate outside of the then-two-party system. He was reelected in 2017 and is now a member of the progressive Social Convergence Party within the Broad Front bloc in Congress.
3. Sebastian Sichel of the Chile Podemos Más coalition was a center-right independent who formerly served as the country's central bank president and served as Minister of Social Development and Family, who beat out former minister Ignacio Briones, Mario Desbordes and Joaquin Lavin in July. Politically, he gained experience in several organizations, among which is the Christian Democratic Party where he militated for over a decade. During the electoral campaign, Sichel positioned himself as a "center" candidate, concerned about the "punished" middle class and the discredit of traditional politics. Sichel, 43, is an independent candidate running on the governing coalition's ticket who has yet to hold elected office. He has run twice unsuccessfully for Congress as a member of the Christian Democratic party in 2009 and 2013 after two years as a subdirector in the state tourism promotion agency during the Bachelet administration. Sichel supports free-market economic policies and also progressive social policies, such as same-sex marriage and adoption. Sichel, who grew up in a relatively unstable and impoverished home, also promises support for childhood food programs, housing, and mental health services.
4. Yasna Provoste, of the center-left Christian Democratic Party, will run under the New Social Pact coalition, made up of other liberal parties such as the Socialist Party and the Party for Democracy. She beat out Carlos Maldonado and Paula Narvaez in this summer's primaries, and represents the policies of former president Michelle Bachelet. New Social Pact (Spanish: Nuevo Pacto Social; NPS), formerly Constituent Unity, is a political alliance in Chile. It includes the former members of the Concentration of Parties for Democracy (the Christian Democratic Party, Radical Party, Socialist Party, and Party for Democracy), plus the Progressive Party and Citizens. This alliance was created in light of the municipal, regional and Constitutional Convention elections, held in May 2021. The only woman and person of indigenous heritage running for president in this cycle, Senate President Provoste is wedged in a tight spot, battling with Boric for the left's vote and with her former party-mate Sichel for the center.
5. Eduardo Artes, a Marxist-Leninist educator and politician of the Patriotic Union and first secretary of the Chilean Communist Party (Proletarian Action), confirmed his candidacy in June 2021, and similarly ran for president unsuccessfully in 2017. Patriotic Union is a Chilean political party founded in September 2015. Legally registered in 2016, it first appeared in the municipal elections of that year. The party obtained 0.32% of the total votes but no candidates were elected to any council. It was declared as an anti-imperialist party, progressive, patriotic and populism.
6. Marco Enriquez Ominami, of the Progressive Party, was a three-time presidential candidate and represents a social democratic group of former lawmakers who continually appear on the ballot, with little luck,
7. Indigenous Mapuche activist Diego Ancalao will compete for the People's List, a citizen pact born from the 2019 mass protests against President Sebastian Piñera.
8. People's Party candidate Franco Parisi
9. independent candidate Gino Lorenzini

If no candidate reaches 40 percent of the votes in the first round, the balloting will be extended to December 19.

According to a survey released on 28 June 2021, Daniel Jadue, the candidate for the Communist Party of Chile, was positioned at the top of the polls for the upcoming presidential elections of 21 November 2021. These data result from the latest Cadem Plaza Pública survey, which positioned the mayor of Recoleta at the head of the race in terms of popular support. He had 14 percent of the spontaneous preference vote, one point more than a week ago, thus remaining at the top of the list. It should be noted that pollster Cadem has close connections to the current right-wing government of Sebastian Piñera.

Behind the communist candidate was Joaquín Lavín, of the far right-wing Independent Democratic Union (UDI), and Yasna Provoste, of the Christian Democratic Party, considered a safe candidate. However, she has not yet been elected by that party, the latter with 13 and 9 percent, respectively.

Daniel Jadue was one of the emerging political figures since the outbreak of the popular revolt in 2018 against the government of Sebastian Piñera. The mayor of a well-to-do commune of Santiago has his first litmus test next July when the primaries of the left will be held. However, the Cadem poll does not predict a good result for the communist candidate in the second round. It placed Senator Yasna Provoste as the winner in an eventual second round against any other opponent.

In fact, it would be in that instance where the legislator would gain strength, in an eventual run-off with Jadue, where she would win with 40 percent of the vote, against Lavín with 39 percent, as well as against the right-wing independent of Chile Vamos, Sebastián Sichel.

On the other hand, Jadue would not fare well in an eventual second round and would also lose the election to Lavín, obtaining only 32 percent against 39 percent of the mayor of Las Condes, according to the poll. He would also not win against Sichel, who would face the same scenario. Pollster Cadem has close ties to the current administration of Sebastian Pinera.

Chile entered the presidential election with four out of seven candidates vying for a place in the widely expected second round, including the unexpected frontrunner was Jose Antonio Kast. According to a survey carried out one month before the Chilean general elections of November 2021, José Antonio Kast would be the candidate with the largest voting intention. As of October 2021, 24 percent of those surveyed would vote for the founder and leader of the right party Partido Republicano. The candidate of the left-wing coalition Apruebo Dignidad, Gabriel Boric, ranked second in voting intention. One month before the election, a fourth of the voters remained undecided. Experts consider that these will be the most uncertain elections of the past years due to the high number of people who do not know for whom to vote and the abstentionism in a country where attendance at the polls was not mandatory.

The presidential candidate of the Republican Party of Chile (ultra-right), José Antonio Kast, received harsh criticism on 15 November 2021 from the right and left candidates for his statements in defense of the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990), in the framework of the debate of the National Television Association (Anatel). "It is regrettable that a person does not know that torture, murder and imprisonment took place during the dictatorship in our country and that he points out that the elections at that time were democratic," said Yasna Provoste, candidate of the Christian Democrat party (center-left). In the last televised debate in which six of the seven candidates for the Chilean presidency participated, the first accusations were concentrated against Kast after he defended Pinochet's dictatorial regime in an interview a week earlier. Even the right-wing candidate of the ruling bloc Chile Podemos Más, Sebastián Sichel, challenged him, saying that "something that we democrats share in general is that violence is never valuable, quoting Pinochet in the 21st century, in a full democracy, is a mistake".

The Chilean Senate rejected on 16 November 2021 the constitutional accusation sent by the deputies to the Senate to impeach President Sebastián Piñera for the case of the sale of a mining company in 2010, which according to the "Pandora Papers" took place in a tax haven, and the president would remain in office. With 24 votes in favor, 18 against and one abstention, the promoters of the impeachment - opposition parliamentarians - did not achieve the necessary majority of 29 votes to remove the president from office. Pinera, who was elected for a second term in December 2017 with 54.5 percent of the vote, has been criticised for taking too long to deliver economic assistance that he promised to Chilean families. the president was leaving office widely unpopular, with his once strong base of support now collapsed and his right-wing coalition still reeling from a shock defeat in the May 2021 elections – and that could have an effect on the upcoming presidential polls.

Chileans are suspicious of traditional politicians, tired of the existing political parties, and eager for new faces. The election is Chile’s most divisive since its 1990 return to democracy, splitting voters between those seeking a shake-up of the Andean country’s free-market model and those demanding a harder line against crime and immigration. If, as is expected, no presidential candidate obtains an outright majority, the top two contenders would face each other in a December 19 run-off election. Far-right former legislator Jose Antonio Kast will meet left-wing activist Gabriel Boric in Chile’s presidential runoff. Jose Antonio Kast had 27.94 percent versus 25.75 percent for Gabriel Boric, with a sizeable gap between them and the rest of the field. In third place was economist Franco Parisi, who is living abroad and did not set foot in Chile during the campaign. He had more than 13 percent of the vote. Centre-right candidate Sebastian Sichel and centre-left Yasna Provoste were just behind, both with about 12 percent.

Boric, a 35-year-old legislator who led student protests in 2011 demanding improvements to Chile’s education system, has pledged to scrap the country’s private pension system – one of the hallmarks of the free-market reforms imposed in the 1980s by Pinochet’s dictatorship. Running as the head of a broad alliance that includes Chile’s Communist Party, if elected, he said he will raise taxes on the “super rich” to expand social services and boost the protection of indigenous people and the environment.

Right-wing politician Jose Antonio Kast has acknowledged Gabriel Boric’s victory in Chile’s presidential runoff; with almost 69 percent of the ballots counted, Boric, of the "I Approve Dignity" coalition, had 55,18% of the votes and Kast has 44,82%, the Electoral Service said. Kast congratulated his rival on the win.

Boric’s election to the country’s top post is not an act of the mainstream left coming to power. In Chile, the traditional Socialist Party appeared to collapse in the face of the new Apruebo Dignidad (Approve Dignity) - an alliance of leftist groups like the Communist Party and Boric’s Social Convergence group, a far-left political platform. In this election it was the far-left versus the far-right - Boric faced up against Jose Antonio Kast, the founder and leader of the far-right Republican Party. But after the election both sides amicably accepted the results.

"It doesn't matter if you did it for me or my opponent; the important thing is that you did it, you were present, you showed your commitment to this country that belongs to each of you," Boric said after his victory was clear. Kast also showed class in his defeat. "From today he is the elected President of Chile and deserves all our respect and constructive collaboration. Chile is always first," he said.

The high voter turnouts will give the next government more legitimacy and a broader base to work with. And in the best democratic tradition, both the losing candidate and the outgoing President Sebastián Piñera congratulated the winner and wished him success. The president-elect will take office on March 11, 2022 for a four-year term, and consecutive terms are not permitted.