This mobilization, which is not directed by any political force, cannot be appeased by repression and militarization, as the Piñera government tried to do, seeking a democratic backlash, nor by compromise from the elite, repeating the tone of the last 30 years and deepening it the disconnect with citizenship.

In the current state of crisis, there is no possible dialogue without the emergence of the states of emergency and the immediate demilitarization of our cities. A minimal guarantee for any advance in resolving the conflict is the restoration of democratic normality in our country.

Sebastián Piñera resigned to power when he announced the State of Emergency and curfew on 19 October. By surrendering the command of our country’s major cities to the military and allowing – for the first time on political grounds since the end of the dictatorship – their return to the streets, not only did it profoundly damage our narrow democracy, but declared that he and his entire cabinet were unable to respond to the felt demands of the people of Chile. This renunciation of politics deepened the social crisis. No sectoral authority has contributed to delivering certainty to the population about transportation, health, schools, safety or even life; they are responsible for bringing the facts to this point. That translated into at least eleven dead whose names and circumstances of death the Home Office did not surrender.

Piñera must assume full political responsibility for the facts and we demand the immediate resignation of all his political committee: Minister of the Interior, Andrés Chadwick, Minister SEGEGOB, Cecilia Pérez, Minister Segpres, Gonzalo Blumel, Minister of Social Development, Sebastián Sichel, and Minister of Farm, Felipe Larraín; along with Transport Minister Gloria Hutt, as well as all the managers of the regions in a state of emergency.

The only possible way out of the social crisis is a clear response to popular demands aimed at overcoming the precariousness of life. The structural problems of the Chilean model must and can be answered politically, focusing on “good living”. Anchored in the dialogue and work with social organizations and movements, we propose to implement a package of urgent anti-neoliberal measures that will start a new stage of transformation and overcome the current crisis of precarious life. Among these measures should be considered the end of the AFP (pension fund agencies), the equalization of the minimum retirement to the minimum wage, the lowering of the working day to 40 hours per week, the revocation of the Water Code, a new Labor Code that surpasses the Dictatorship Labor Plan, strengthening public education at all levels, ensuring its free and non-sexist orientation, free public transport and the immediate beginning of a constituent process through a Constituent Assembly.

We make the call to the population and especially our activism to remain mobilized and to prevent the feeling of chaos from prevailing in the population. This requires the support of neighbors and grassroots organizations, the enhancement of community media and the security of our neighborhoods as a priority over the suppression of just mobilization.

The current political crisis marks a point of no return in the country’s political history and presents itself as an opportunity to build a more participatory, deeply democratic Chile with guaranteed social rights and where popular and territorial organization overcomes the current atomization state, giving way to a solid social fabric that guarantees a fairer and fuller society.

BRUNO MAGALHÃES

National Directorate of Social Convergence