October 23, 2019

By Jonathan Franklin

Largely under-reported in the US, a massive uprising is underway in Chile against entrenched inequality. Martial law has been declared by billionaire right-wing President Sebastián Piñera.

A force of 9,000 heavily armed military and police swarmed Santiago Monday night and into Tuesday morning as they hunted down Chileans defying a fourth night of martial law. As helicopters and army truck convoys patrolled Santiago and other regions of the country, groups of armed law enforcement agents prowled the city with masks, firing repeatedly at civilians.

“I was coming home and the military patrol stopped me. They put me in the truck and bah, bah, bah. Three times they bashed me with the butt of the gun in the head,” said a bruised and bleeding protestor interviewed as he stumbled home hours after curfew was enacted. “I told them my teeth were broken to stop, but no, bah! Bah! Bah! They kicked me and took my friend away.”

Gunshots echoed throughout Santiago for hours in the worst outbreak of government violence in decades. No firm estimates of deaths and wounded were available as government tally remained at 15 deaths while journalists and human rights observers tallied far more. 

“The treatment by the military is not dignified,” said Carlos a 21 year old street vendor. “If they want to arrest me then do it, but this is not humane.  An arrest is normal. I am doing what I have to do…but .to beat people to their limit, that is torture.”

Asked whether he accepted the burning of the subway system, Carlos “I don´t think that it was our people who burned the metros. It´s impossible its 90 percent cement. With a molotov?” 

After three days of looting and mass protests, Chilean president Sebastian Pinera on Monday declared “we are at war” and posed with a dozen uniformed military officials in a photo that many took to be a deliberate attempt to terrorize the population with reminders of the 17 year Pinochet dictatorship. But attempts to scare the population backfired as tens of thousands of Chileans danced, played music, organized football games in the street long past the 8pm order to be off the streets. 

In Plaza Nunoa, hundreds of families celebrated by banging on pots and pans, holding up hand written placards calling on President Pinera to renounce his post and allow a new government to handle the increasingly chaotic situation. With ports and mines threatening to shut down in solidarity with the widening protests, a schism has erupted in Chile just weeks after President Pinera celebrated that following the chaos rocking Peru and Ecuador  Chile was “an oasis.”

While President Pinera argued that a small group of organized criminals were organizing the mass burning of subway stations and buildings throughout the country, small groups of vandals took to all corners of the country to rage against a system they called unfair and dominated by a small elite. Self defence groups with yellow vests set up citizen militias to defend gas stations and small businesses from further looting and attacks.

Along Avenida Grecia in the middle class neighborhood of Nunoa, a small group of masked Chileans hid behind trees as a military convoy crashed through their rickety barricades. At 1145pm, nearly four hours after a military curfew was imposed in an attempt to slow the mass looting and burning that has left Chile´s famed stability in ashes, the masked protestors remain defiant. 

“This is not just about the metro, it is about a cumulation of situations and the crisis of this economic model that have been dragging since we returned to democracy,” said a 31 year old masked women. “They have privatized healthcare. Pensions for the elderly are miserable. We have conflicts in every part of our day to day life, Day to day we suffer and the only thing the government is criminalizar a situation that in truth they have dragged on for so long...The dictatorship is over. Our generation is not afraid. But now the military are using the same strategy that they used in dictatorship, they are shooting in many regions, many comunas. In Antofagasta it is a mess, in Coquimbo they have killed people, in the south...This is a national battle, not just Santiago, we have to keep fighting until this is resolved for all, not just for a sector of the society. Not for the privileged. Not for the businessmen.”

As she concluded a small sedan swerves through the barricade and armed men with the windows down began firing shotguns at this journalist. Hiding behind a tree, the bark splits open. No one is hit. Running into the public housing projects the 7 rebels make it out alive. When the car leaves, two more shots are fired at the hiding protestors in a scene reminscient of the terror regime of Augusto Pinochet. 

Jonathan Franklin is The Guardian reporter in Chile. He writes about Chile, crime and human rights. His latest book, 438 Days, chronicles the saga of two fisherman lost at sea for more than a year. He can be followed on Twitter at @FranklinBlog and on his website, JonathanFranklin.com

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Reposted with permission of the author