The leftist candidate Jeannette Jara and the far-right leader José Antonio Kast They will face each other in the second round of the presidential elections of Chile after winning in the first round results of the Sunday, November 16 in an election dominated by fear of violent crime.
With the 99 percent of results scrutinizedJara, a 51-year-old communist running on behalf of an eight-party coalition, won the 26.85 percentcompared to the 23.93 percent of Kast, as reported by the electoral service Servel.
The electoral campaign was marked by deep concern about the increase in murders, kidnappings and extortions, crimes widely attributed to foreign criminal gangs.
Cupboard, the 59 yearshas promised to build walls, fences and ditches along Chile’s border with Bolivia to prevent the entry of migrants from poorer northern countries, such as Venezuela.
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Kast promises to ‘rebuild’ the country after the results of the elections in Chile
After Sunday’s results were announced, he promised to “rebuild” Chile after four years of center-left government, which he described as “perhaps the worst government in Chile’s democratic history.”
“Chile woke up tonight,” declared the father of nine, a strict and ultra-conservative man, adding that while perhaps “he wasn’t the nicest,” he felt he had a mandate from a million Chilean voters.
The right also won the majority in the simultaneous elections to the Chamber of Deputies and the Senateaccording to partial results.
Jara, who was part of the government of the outgoing leftist president Gabriel Boric, struggled to overcome strong anti-communist sentiment in one of the most open economies in Latin America.
His victory, by a much smaller margin than the polls predicted, was seen as a bad omen for the second round and gave no reason for joy at his electoral party.
Rodrigo Arellanoanalyst of the University for the Development of Chilesaid it seemed “unlikely” that he could win the Dec. 14 runoff.
“Not only is his vote count low, but the combined total of opposition candidates is almost more than double his,” he noted, linking his score to strong anti-ruler and anti-communist sentiment.
“Do not let fear harden your hearts,” Jara pleaded with voters, insisting that the response to crime was not “to propose ideas, each one more radical than the last.”
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The vote is seen as a key indicator of support for the South American left, which has lost power in Argentina and Bolivia in the last two years and faces a tough challenge in next year’s Colombian and Brazilian elections.
The maverick economist Franco Parisi caused a surprise by finishing third, ahead of the far-right deputy Johannes Kaiser and the former conservative mayor Evelyn Mattheithe establishment candidate, who came fifth.
Parisi refrained from endorsing either Jara or Kast in the second round, saying that both needed to go out and find new voters “on the streets.”