Tonight, the main leaders of the government coalition parties, after tense negotiations, reached an agreement to specify changes to the Constitution in the event that the Approval wins in the exit plebiscite on September 4.
The scope of the agreement, which will be stamped in a document, will be announced this Thursday at 11:30 in the Library of the National Congress, in Santiago.
However, tonight, from the Legislative headquarters, some of those attending the meeting -which included, among others, the helmsmen of the Communist Party, Guillermo Teillier; of Democratic Revolution, Juan Ignacio Latorre; of the Socialist Party, Paulina Vodanovic, and the deputy Diego Ibáñez, of Social Convergence-, gave insights into what they covered during the day.
The Presidente del PC, Guillermo TeillierI affirm that “We have come up with a proposal to deliver it to the presidents of the parties tomorrow and give it the final approval. This will be announced later, at 11:30 in the Library of the National Congress”.
He added that it is an agreement “satisfactory for all”, where “Some reforms, some clarifications, improvements are proposed, in various matters: political, judicial, indigenous and above all what interests people, which are social policies.”
Asked if this agreement would give the Approve a better chance of prevailing on September 4, Teiller said: “I think so, because A disinformation campaign has been installed in the country that has confused many people, and I think that with this they will be sure that they will be able to vote fully informed and with the certainty that we are going to make a commitment that those things that, in some way, are not well understood or are not considered to be well represented in the text, we are going to work so that, after the Approval, they can be implemented. in laws or constitutional reforms.
For his part, the deputy Diego Ibáñez, of Social Convergenceindicated that “We believe that these implementation, improvement and interpretation agreements are extremely necessary. and that is precisely the invitation that the President makes us and that we accept and fulfill it”.
Asked if this initiative could influence the exit plebiscite vote, Ibáñez sostuco that “As political parties we cannot assume a sovereign will that is much broader than the citizenry. Here we are just an actor who intends to help clarify what is going to happen from September 4 onwards when the new Constitution is approved.
“No Constitution in the world is built on a stone. The ones built in stone are called dictatorships. What we want is a democracy, and what a democracy allows is debate, modification, improvement, improvement”he added.
The negotiations, in which President Gabriel Boric was personally involved, were stalled until late Wednesday afternoon. From the PS they pointed out that the Broad Front and the Communist Party They did not want to give in their positions.
According to those familiar with the talks, the political system It was the point of greatest complexity. Neither the FA nor the PC wanted to make considerable changes to the proposal for a new Constitution emanating from the Convention.
There are two critical areas of the political system that they do not want to modify: the legislative system, because they do not want to give more powers to the Chamber of Regions -which replaces the Senate-, and the concurrence laws, which are what allow legislators present initiatives that incur fiscal spending.
The relative to the initiatives that allow fiscal spending it is a matter that had also been warned by President Gabriel Boric himself as an area that must be corrected.
And there, according to a sector of the ruling party, the President has insisted that it must be perfected. In fact, the President himself has led talks to try to unblock the negotiations. In the last few hours he has taken his phone to directly contact the helmsmen of the government coalition parties, either to insist on some points or ask them to abandon others.
“I have spoken with the president of the PC just as I have spoken with the president of the PPD and the PS and there is a broad will to improve the aspects regarding which there are doubts in the implementation, such as others of the constitutional project that can be improved”, he said on Tuesday, in an interview with a local media outlet in Puerto Montt.
In this framework, from 7:00 p.m. this Wednesday, and for four hours, President Gabriel Boric met with the leadership and the benches of the Party for Democracy (PPD) at Cerro Castilloin Viña del Mar, as part of a series of meetings held with the ruling coalition parties, with a view to advancing the reforms that the government is promoting.
The president of the PPD, Natalia Piergentili, stressed that the most important aspect of this meeting was the assessment that President Boric gave to the party’s proposal for “approve to improve”, which was reflected in the agreement reached tonight by the ruling party.
“President Boric noted that we had been able to take the citizen’s pulse regarding many people who are at the heart of the project (of a constitutional proposal), but who have legitimate doubts or fears of some aspects that had been left unclear,” Piergentili said, adding that “in no case does this agreement go against the heart of the proposal, but rather circumscribe it so that it is a better proposal.”
“In all those matters where, in the polls, in the focus, there were doubts from the citizens, misrepresentations on the part of the right of how the constitutional text was understood, we were especially careful to address and clarify them,” he added.
For its part, the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Raúl Sotoheld that “As of September 5 we are going to need a transversal agreement, much broader than the agreement from which white smoke is coming out (in Congress) regarding the coalitions of the Approval to make the best ones, but rather that a transversal agreement for these improvements and implementation to be viable with legislative majorities, if he wins the Approval, and that implies that we have to cross the sidewalk and also talk with the opposition, to agree with them on what those elements are going to be that we are going to carry out tomorrow”.
“In the event that the Rachazo wins, that same unification agreement, transversal, political, and facing the citizens, we are going to need it to set the rules of the game for a new roadmap for constitutional change”he added.