A year after his election, Borik is moving towards “pragmatism”

(EFE) changed his discourse and modified his policy in alliances, according to experts who appealed to a management style similar to the one that led him to victory in the second round.

At only 36 years old, Borik arrived at the presidential palace in La Moneda with the most advanced electoral program since the socialist Salvador Allende (1970-1973), an electoral feat that stood out for his strength – he received more than 55% of the vote and the highest participation in history in elections Presidential – and Surprised On Jose Antonio Kast, winner of the first round.

Since then, in the midst of a country reeling from the COVID-19 pandemic and still shaken by the 2019 popular protest — which unlocked the foundational process — the president has veered toward pragmatism, adjusting his bets, if at all, analysts say. The defeat that would have meant the rejection of the new Basic Law, a text that his ministers believed was the key to being able to carry out “structural transformations” and which left the possibility of putting it in the hands of Congress, where the opposition has a majority and obliges it to negotiate.

Borik gradually moderated his rhetoric, speaking more directly to the average voter who does not necessarily sympathize with the left.

“Borik gradually began to modify his rhetoric, speaking more directly to the average voter who is not necessarily sympathetic to the left, who is disappointed, and who might have supported the rejection (of the new constitution) without necessarily feeling discriminated against by the right.” Explains to EFE the Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences at Universidade Diego Portales, Rossana Castiglione

“I think the president, on the basis of these findings, has tried to approach the more moderate picture,” he insists.

A change the expert and his other colleagues believe was triggered with the restructuring of the cabinet after a refusal victory in the constitutional consultations by adding figures from the Democratic Socialists to the cabinet, a coalition made up of parties linked to the party. Concertación, the coalition that managed the transition and which Borik himself has criticized in the past.

“The government, after the massive defeat caused by the referendum, ends up returning to the second round of its election speech,” Rodrigo Pérez de Ars, an analyst from the Institute for Society Studies (IES), tells Efe.

And he adds, “In this particular case, it ends up translating more clearly into the entry of Social Democracy into positions of high importance, especially the Interior Ministry and the General Secretariat of the Presidency of the Republic.”

A tide that everyone agrees definitively changed last week, when the president intervened in the long debate over the future of the founding process – which was dominated by the opposition’s story – and asserted that the “incomplete agreement” was better than the Byzantine negotiations. long time.

Boric’s victory in the second round, which took place on December 19, was a severe blow to the right sectors, which were left in a “retreat position” according to Castiglioni, and had to put up a strong opposition to regain the ground lost after the bloody suppression of the popular protests of 2019, known as “fascism”. Social”.

“The result of the founding referendum ended up re-establishing this right. Not necessarily because one could read the refusal as support for the sector, because that was certainly not the case,” says the academic.

“Borek does not control Congress and it is clear that he will need to build agreements with the opposition, and that any agreement that would solve the crisis in the country must include the right.”

“But that was because it was clear that as a result of that outcome Congress (where the opposition has a majority) had a much more important role in the founding process than it had hitherto,” he adds.

“Borek does not control Congress and it is clear that he will need to build agreements with the opposition, and that any agreement that would solve the crisis in the country must include the right, and this left him in a much more favorable position.”

In this context, ambiguity still exists for the new year about the role played by the more radial right, which, according to analysts, is trying to put pressure on its allies and obtain greater influence despite its “fragmentation and poor vision.”

“The movement has taken place in many areas. One can see that the centre-right, which became very depressed after the first round, is beginning to regain a certain space in the constitutional debate where it takes a somewhat leading role, while today’s (radical) party, the Republican tightening the political arc to gain space. And we’ll have to see how that translates in the coming months, “concludes Pérez de Ars.

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