Earthquake in the Chilean Government: Boric changes several ministers after the failure of the plebiscite

SEBASTIN FEST Santiago de Chile Updated Tuesday, September 6, 2022 – 21:39 Carolina Toh, with a long career, who worked with Lagos and Bachelet and is the daughter of an Allende minister, is appointed as head of the Interior. Carabineros arrest a protester. Sebastian ancoEFEChile “We are the champions”: a party against the Constitution, but with a call for unity Plebiscite Chile says a resounding “no” to Boric’s Constitution and forces a political consensus The experiment did not last even six months, and the resounding defeat in the plebiscite finished closing it: Gabriel Boric, who arrived in March at the Palacio de La Moneda as the president most to the left since Salvador Allende in the ’70s, accelerated this Tuesday the social democratic reconversion of his government and designated as his “number two” to Carolina Toh, a woman with a long career who worked with presidents Eduardo Frei, Ricardo Lagos and Michelle Bachelet. The change came in a context of tension: a few blocks from the Palacio de La Moneda, a A student demonstration took over La Alameda, the capital’s main artery, in a protest movement known as “backpacking.” Some students set fire to a series of barricades and the police reacted by launching water jets. A little over a decade ago, Boric was one of the students who led the protest marches. At the time the new government was due to appear, the confusion was evident: everything was delayed an hour and a half. La Moneda had announced the appointment of Nicols Cataldo, a member of the Communist Party (PC), as Undersecretary of the Interior. After changing the description of him on Twitter, presenting himself in the new position, Cataldo began to delete old tweets. Without success: the messages in which he described the Carabineros, the Chilean Military Police, as “torturers”, circulated throughout the country. His transfer from the Ministry of Education to the Interior was canceled and the communists were furious. “This is the Chilean right, anti-democratic. I imagine that if they had had a communist president they would have staged a coup,” said Boris Barrera, head of the CP parliamentary group. The smoke from the gases launched by the police smelled and burned in the eyes during the ceremony of changes in seven ministries in the inner courtyard of the Palacio de La Moneda. Some students bellowed outside. The startling stumble confirms Boric’s struggles to put together a solid team. Bringing the government together is, in part, the job of Toh, 57. Daughter of an Interior Minister from Allende, who was tortured and died in 1974, during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, Toh was a deputy, minister and mayor of Santiago, as well as president of the Social Democratic Party for Democracy (PPD). Away from the forefront of politics, Toh returned after the social outbreak of October 2019. Defined as “solid and pragmatic”, her arrival at the Interior -which in fact functions as a vice-presidency, a position that does not contemplate the Chilean institutional organization chart – ends with Izkia Siches, Boric’s campaign manager, former president of the Medical College and who was unable to gain a foothold in office despite Boric’s wishes. “Cabinet changes are always dramatic in Chile, and this one has not lacked its dose. It had to hurt and it hurts, but it is necessary. It is one of the most difficult moments politically that I have had to face. I do not have to hide it, “admitted Boric. “We will move forward together. We need a new coordination of the government and I want us to strengthen the coalition together. The constitutional process will continue.” According to the criteria of The Trust Project Learn more