NewsLatin AmericaVoting begins in the referendum of the new constitution in Chile

Voting begins in the referendum of the new constitution in Chile

Urn of the constitutional pebliscito of Chile celebrated on September 4, 2022 – JOSE HUMBERTO CAMPOS / AGENCYUNO

MADRID, Sep. 4 (EUROPA PRESS) –

This Sunday at 8:00 a.m. (2:00 p.m. in mainland Spain) the vote on the draft Constitution prepared by the Constitutional Convention has begun after almost a year of work. The polls will close ten hours later, with the possibility of extending the hours if there are queues of voters.

More than 15 million Chileans are called to participate in this process in which voting is compulsory, including Chileans residing abroad.

The Electoral Service of Chile (Servel) has also organized the day so that expatriate citizens can participate. Spain is the second country with the most potential voters –more than 11,600–, only behind the United States. The voting process has already begun in cities such as Vienna, Dublin, London, Amsterdam or Stockholm.

The Servel establishes that no school will be able to close after midnight in Chile and plans to start publishing the results this Sunday, as they become available after the closing of the voting centers.

Voters will answer this question: “Do you approve the text of the New Constitution proposed by the Constitutional Convention?”

According to the proposed text, the State of Chile is now considered “plurinational”, the right of indigenous populations to give their opinion on matters that affect them is contemplated, and abortion rights are written down –without expressly naming it– or in terms of housing.

The reforms also extend to some of the main institutions, with a structural change in the judicial system and the disappearance of the Senate, reconverted into a House of Representatives in the event that the “approval” wins.

Boric himself has campaigned in favor of the approval of the new draft, about which he has “a good opinion”, despite the fact that he assumes that “there are always things that can be improved”, as he himself has recognized this week in a interview published by the American magazine ‘Time’.

The president has recognized throughout the drafting process the apparent disaffection of the citizens that the polls already reflected, which has ended up being translated into an advantage of ‘rejection’. Polls give this option a lead of up to ten points, although no poll has been published since August 20.

Numerous public faces have joined the campaign for change, such as former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet. The former president Sebastian Pinera, on the other hand, remains silent, although his entourage has slipped into local media that he is leaning towards the ‘no’.

If the ‘approval’ wins, it will mean the immediate repeal of the Constitution drawn up in 1980, regardless of the fact that the new Magna Carta may be open to changes. The Government has already announced that it will seek a reform to propose, for example, that the President of Chile cannot stand for re-election.

The victory of ‘rejection’, on the other hand, leaves everything as it is. However, Boric has ruled out that he means returning to the starting box and opts, instead, to return to the 2020 plebiscite, since he considers that the then mandate “is still in force.”

“If eventually it were to win the rejection, which is legitimate, we must continue with that mandate of the people,” he told ‘Time’, which would happen by once again launching the call for a new Constitutional Convention. “It’s not a whim,” he insisted.

Source: Europa Press

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