Aged 36, Boric took control of a country demanding change, following mass protests in 2019 he led. His campaign platform voices the fight against deep-rooted inequalities in income, healthcare, education and pensions.
The uprising, which left dozens dead and hundreds injured, was the catalyst for the process now underway to amend Chile’s dictatorial-era constitution.
Boric has vowed to abandon Chile’s neoliberal economic model dating back to Augusto Pinochet’s military era that is widely seen as marginalizing the poor and working groups.
One percent of Chile’s population is known to control about a quarter of the country’s wealth.
Despite concerns over the alliance of his political party, Frente Amplio, with the Communist Party in the traditionally center-leaning country, Boric surprisingly won last December’s general election. She managed to mobilize women and young people, with a record turnout that gave her nearly 56 percent of the vote to beat Pinochet’s supporter, Jose Antonio Kast.
In his victory speech Boric vowed to “expand social rights” in Chile, but would do so by taking into account the balance between government spending and taxes. [ab/ka]