Chile Elects First Socialist Leader Since ’73 Coup

Ricardo Lagos, a leading dissident during this country’s 17-year dictatorship and a Cabinet minister in subsequent elected governments, defeated rightist Joaquin Lavin on Sunday to become Chile’s first Socialist president since the late Salvador Allende was overthrown in a 1973 coup.

Lagos, a professorial 61-year-old, won 51% of the vote to Lavin’s 48% and beat back a rejuvenated political right that threatened to retake the presidency for the first time since former dictator Augusto Pinochet stepped down in 1990.

“We have triumphed, but the joy of the moment does not cloud our reason,” said Lagos, who received a congratulatory embrace from Lavin at the Socialist’s campaign headquarters Sunday night. “Our victory is just and beautiful, but it is not a defeat for anyone. I will be the president of all Chileans.”

Lagos culminated the most dramatic election campaign since the return of democracy with a decisive comeback, after the first round of voting ended in a virtual draw last month. He was the perceived favorite then and was stunned at being forced into a runoff by underdog Lavin, 46, a former suburban mayor with a formidable war chest and a telegenic, pragmatic image.

The suspense of the campaign’s final days was heightened by a surprise in London, where Pinochet has spent 15 months in custody facing an extradition request by a Spanish judge on charges of torture by his military regime. British authorities announced last week that doctors had found the 84-year-old former dictator unfit to stand trial. Britain’s home secretary is expected to decide as soon as Tuesday whether to permit him to return to Chile.

That news cheered Lagos and his colleagues in the ruling center-left coalition, who had worked to win the release of Pinochet, their longtime nemesis, and hoped for a boost among voters who saw the development as a victory for the government. But both candidates reacted cautiously, and analysts did not believe the probable return of Pinochet had much impact on Sunday’s electoral outcome.

“The first reaction is that [the Pinochet news] favors Lagos,” said political scientist Ricardo Israel. “But when a race is so close, the repercussions could go in more than one direction.”

While Lagos might have gained some centrist voters who opposed a trial overseas, he probably lost some staunchly anti-Pinochet leftists who feel betrayed by the government, analysts said. Although Pinochet still casts a long shadow over this nation of 15 million, his absence largely eliminated him as a campaign issue and helped advance Chile’s democratic transition.

“Pinochet’s disappearance was good for the country,” Israel said. “I don’t see any conflict that looks insurmountable.”

The Lavin camp had hoped its candidate’s momentum was insurmountable, but Lagos sharpened his message and softened a demeanor that came off as aloof. He reached out to centrist and women voters who were drawn to Lavin’s conservative Roman Catholicism and folksy slogans, and replaced his campaign chief with a female former justice minister who is the nation’s most admired political figure.

In addition, Lagos picked up supporters of three leftist candidates who got about 4% of the earlier vote, Dec. 12, and from some of the hundreds of thousands of voters who had cast blank protest ballots then.

As a result, Chile has achieved another milestone in a democratic transition only a few years after some Chileans feared that the election of a Socialist would provoke a violent reaction by the military.

In a speech to a crowd of about 15,000 near the presidential palace, La Moneda, where Allende is believed to have killed himself as Pinochet’s planes bombarded the stately stone building, Lagos made references to the past and to heroes of the left such as poet Pablo Neruda. At one point, the crowd began chanting “A trial for Pinochet!”

“Trials are decided by the courts, and I will make sure the decisions of the courts are respected,” Lagos responded. Reiterating his conciliatory tone, however, he declared: “I will not forget the past, but my eyes are on the future.”

The new president is a dignified academic with a degree in economics from Duke University, in North Carolina, who was Allende’s nominee to be ambassador to the Soviet Union before the U.S.-backed coup. Lagos endured exile and jail during the dictatorship, whose repression claimed more than 3,000 lives.

A single act of courage and political theater launched Lagos into public life in 1988, when he led the campaign to defeat a referendum to keep Pinochet in power. During a television debate, he pointed his finger at the camera and addressed Pinochet directly, denouncing the torture and tyranny of his regime. It was an electrifying moment for Chileans, who tend to be reserved and deferential, and gave Lagos instant hero status.

After Pinochet lost the referendum and kept his promise to step down, Lagos served as minister of education and public works in the 1990s, consolidating an intellectual style and a social democratic philosophy that have drawn comparisons to his friends President Fernando Henrique Cardoso of Brazil and former Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez of Spain. Lagos joins the growing ranks of center-left leaders who hold power in Latin America and Europe.

Another sign that suggests that Chilean attitudes are changing: Lagos was elected despite the fact that he is an agnostic, divorced and in his second marriage, all of which are considered political obstacles in this profoundly Catholic society that still outlaws divorce.

Although Chile has endured a year of economic crisis after a decade of prosperity, the thoughtful, gentlemanly campaign showed that the nation is in good shape compared with Latin American countries whose politics are marred by conflict, extremism and corruption. Lagos and Lavin refrained from attacking each other and emphasized issues such as unemployment, crime and health care.

Moreover, the narrow margin in Sunday’s voting made it clear that Lavin’s skillful campaign has changed the political landscape. The past decade was dominated by the Concertacion, as the center-left coalition is known, although smaller right-wing parties are strengthened by a Pinochet-era constitution that grants them undemocratic advantages. Lagos has promised to hold a referendum to do away with that constitution.

Lavin, a former newspaper editor and Pinochet admirer, reinvented the right by breaking with hard-core Pinochet partisans and campaigning aggressively among the poor. He went as far as agreeing with Lagos that the ex-dictator and other military officers accused of human rights abuses should be prosecuted by Chilean courts.

Taking advantage of an edge of at least 3 to 1 in campaign funds, Lavin spent lavishly on a cheerful, upbeat message that promised to solve everyday problems and rejected the divisiveness of the past. His performance makes him the formidable leader of an emboldened opposition.

“We cannot be sad,” Lavin told supporters Sunday night. “The message of change has been felt. I want Ricardo Lagos and Chile to know that they can always count on me.”

The first test of that offer of harmony could come if Britain sends Pinochet home as expected. British Home Secretary Jack Straw has said he is inclined to release the dictator and has given Spanish authorities, human rights groups and other interested parties until Tuesday to file arguments against a release on medical grounds. Battles over lingering legal issues, such as Straw’s insistence on keeping the medical tests secret, could still take place in London.

But many Chilean leaders and political observers believe that Pinochet will return within weeks, if not sooner. And Lagos has declared repeatedly that he wants Chilean courts to proceed with a 55-count investigation of Pinochet by a magistrate who already has locked up high-ranking military officers accused of kidnapping and murdering political opponents.

The military has remained silent as aging generals have been arrested, but a prosecution of Pinochet would be the ultimate test of its discipline. Moreover, before any trial, the magistrate would first have to ask the courts to remove the parliamentary immunity that the ex-dictator acquired when he resigned as army chief and became senator for life, a post created by his constitution. An appellate court and the Supreme Court would decide whether the evidence merited such a momentous decision.

Thus, even if the presidential campaign showed how much Pinochet has faded as a political force, his return could revive the conflict that the candidates avoided. Human rights advocates find it ironic that he could be released for humanitarian reasons at the urging of longtime foes such as Lagos.

“Pinochet has had all his rights--a right to a fair trial, medical attention, everything his victims did not have,” said Viviana Diaz, the leader of a group of relatives of his regime’s victims.

“Now he might return for humanitarian reasons. This is going to be a big problem for Lagos.”