NewsLatin AmericaGabriel Boric's partner closes their La Moneda office

Gabriel Boric’s partner closes their La Moneda office

The president of Chile, Gabriel Boric, with the first lady, Irina Karamanos in La Moneda, Santiago.CRISTOBAL ESCOBAR/AGENCIAUNO

The couple of Chilean President Gabriel Boric, Irina Karamanos, assumed on March 11 the Sociocultural Coordination of the Chilean Government, from where six foundations were directed in the hands of the person who exercises the functions of first lady in each Administration. She did so despite the fact that the traditional figure was criticized in the presidential campaign and despite the rejection by the feminist movement, although with the commitment to renew this space. Nine months after arriving in La Moneda, where Karamanos has her office and has a budget and direct advisers, the first lady announced this Thursday the closure of the Sociocultural Coordination as of December 31. With this decision she formally ends her position, as she had announced in September, and she leaves the historic building.

“A new stage begins, where with a different role we will be able to continue advancing with the personal development and autonomy of each one of us. It is a stage that makes me proud in the sense of being able to innovate the look that a presidential couple can have ”, Karamanos said today, in a relationship with Boric since 2019. With this decision, he added, a change can be made against “ the stereotypes culturally associated with this role of first ladies”.

For the president, meanwhile, this Thursday’s announcement fulfills “a commitment” that his government assumed: “This is an important step forward,” said Boric, who is facing a complex mandate, with low popularity, a recent defeat in the constituent process and aspirations for profound changes, at the beginning of a 2023 with economic recession.

In these nine months, the administrative transfer of the six foundations under his responsibility to various ministries was completed, which means that Karamanos, a social scientist with studies in Anthropology and Educational Sciences at the University of Heidelberg, will no longer arrive daily to the Government Palace. In an interview with EL PAIS in October, Karamanos, 33, assured that he would continue to carry out protocol work accompanying Boric: “We are going to define which are the trips or protocol instances in which it makes sense for us to be together.”

For her, the reformulation of the position halfway between the public and the private “consists of a greater independence of attitude, of opinion, at a professional level and also at an economic level. We have to look for the possibility that there is more freedom, that the couples of the presidents can continue with their professional lives”. She is a member of Convergencia Social, the same Broad Front party where she is a member of Boric, in the interview she assured that she “would like to go back to doing research in study centers, at the university.”

Karamanos made the announcement at an activity at the Sound Museum in Santiago, where he took stock of his management. She was accompanied by President Boric, the Ministers for Women, Culture, Science and the Minister of Education. The Integra, Prodemu, Tiempos Nuevos, Chilenter, Artesanias de Chile and FOJI foundations –related to different areas of cultural, educational and technological activity– will depend on various portfolios as of 2023. The presidency of the boards will not be occupied by the couple of the president as was traditional, but will be defined by the ministers themselves.

Boric’s government declares itself feminist and its Cabinet is made up of a greater number of women than men. The Minister for Women, Antonia Orellana, is part of the president’s political committee, the body where the main decisions of the Chilean Executive are made. The Social Convergence militant has a great influence on decisions of various kinds and she seeks for feminism to transcend all the Government’s State decisions and policies.

The decision of Boric and Karamanos to take office in March drew criticism from important voices of the feminist movement, such as that of the academic Alejandra Castillo, from the Metropolitan University of Educational Sciences (UMCE): “Together with the statement made by Gabriel Boric that hers would be a feminist government – ​​emulating the gesture made a few years earlier by Michelle Bachelet, when she stated that hers would be a parity government – ​​the figure of the first lady was accepted. It was a failed decision, from my perspective: with one hand feminism is affirmed and with the other the patriarchal figures of the State are maintained, ”said the author in an interview with EL PAIS. Regarding La Moneda’s formula to end this role and transfer the foundations in charge of the Sociocultural Coordination to other organizations, Sepulveda pointed out in November: “It seems very necessary to eliminate the position of first lady and transfer her functions to other institutions far from the loving bond of the president or president”.

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