Giorgio Jackson, Gabriel Boric and Camila Vallejo.Courtesy
Chilean President Gabriel Boric has suffered a serious political and human defeat: this Friday evening, on the eve of a long weekend, his main ally and friend Giorgio Jackson resigned after an hour-long meeting from the Department of Social Development alone in La Moneda. He does so amid announcing the constitutional right to impeach him in Congress to secure his release in the Convenios case, a plot to divert public funds into foundations primarily linked to the Jackson-founded and led Revolución Democrática (RD) party. . . However, the pressure came even from the ruling party. His fall, considered premature and late given the bleeding it caused, marks the end of a political triangle that debuted on the streets during university protests in 2011 and 2012 and reached La Moneda in March 2022: that of Boric, Jackson and Camila Vallejo, a communist activist, the minister’s current spokeswoman.
“I submitted my resignation to the President in an irresistible manner because I believe that policies and frameworks for agreements must be put in place, however unfair they may be. “That belief helped me deliver this tough message to the President,” Jackson said Friday. It is a resignation that comes at a time when the government is pushing ahead with two of its key election promises, the tax pact and pension reform, which have been stalled by the opposition due to various factors including the minister’s departure.
Your decision, even if based on an enormous injustice to you, is a very generous gesture. I know that your only interest in those 12 years was to build a dignified and just country for all. I hope that now we can move forward definitively and without excuses to improve the agreements… pic.twitter.com/52JaWdxYHa
—Camila Vallejo Dowling (@camila_vallejo) August 12, 2023
The Convenios case, for which prosecutors have launched a mega-investigation, has not only triggered a political crisis, the biggest in this government, but also violated the probity promise of the Broad Front, the young left-wing coalition. This is a group that, in the midst of the presidential campaign, adopted as an anthem an iconic song by Argentine Leon Gieco, Los salieris de Charly, to mark the distance from previous generations. “They say the youth don’t have enough experience to govern. Glad I never have. steal experience. Glad I never have. lying experience.
Jackson was Boric’s campaign manager and installed Jackson when the President took office, at the age of 35 (he was the only one of the group to have reached the constitutional age to present himself as a presidential candidate). as a cornerstone – then 34 years old – as Minister of the General Secretariat of the Presidency (Segpres), responsible for relations with Parliament, and Vallejo as spokesman. He also nominated the doctor Izkia Siches in Interior, former head of the students of the University of Chile. Siches was the first to leave the government after a complex debut that included an attack in Mapuche territory, and after six months she was ousted after losing the September 2022 constitutional vote. Yet despite being very close to the President, Siches was not part of the historic political triangle.
For this reason, says sociologist and political scientist Alfredo Joignant, columnist for EL PAÍS, Jackson’s departure implies that “things in just 17 months of government are the essence of the President’s circle of trust.” Boric said he was forced to resign and left the President in a big orphanage.”
Jackson, a reference
Several analysts polled by EL PAÍS agree that Jackson was one of the most propelled figures in the history of this group. “He was always a benchmark for the generation that challenged the traditional parties, that entered politics early and sought their own way. “He was the most prominent, the one with the greatest political potential,” says political scientist Pamela Figueroa. “If I had to imagine who the leader of this generation was, it was Jackson. Even to get to La Moneda. But for different reasons, they led him down a different path,” adds Figueroa.
Mauricio Morales, political scientist at the University of Talca, points out from the ex-minister’s account that his departure is “a very significant defeat”. He recalls that “Jackson’s political generation was electorally successful only on par with the generation led by Eduardo Frei Montalva since the 1950s, culminating in his 1964 presidential election. Jackson quickly put together a political party, leading the Broad Front and opposing the They protest against the Concertación (centre-left coalition that ruled Chile between 1990 and 2010) by openly criticizing their governments and the country’s progress in Ask a Question.”
Morales also recalls that during the tenure of Sebastián Piñera (2018-2022), a center-right Democrat, during his tenure as MP, “Jackson represented Chileans’ uneasiness about the achievement of democracy, which was at its peak.” the social outburst of 2019”. And the analyst adds, “The next step was to get the presidency, and they did it.” Then came the constitutional amendment. With the defeat in the referendum in September 2022, the disintegration of this political generation began. Because of this, he adds with his departure, “all the newly formed parts of the country are dying, at least in the short term.”
The political scientist asserts that “Jackson got caught up in the disruptive and overwhelming discourse, leaving an image indistinguishable from the traditional politics that he himself criticized.” “He leaves government through the back door and only meets defeat both in the referendum and in the election of the Constitutional Councils (last May, where the Republican Party triumphed). Worst of all, it leaves his coalition at the mercy of the far right.
Rodrigo Pérez de Arce, a researcher at the Institute for Society Studies (IES), points out that Jackson’s departure was very hard not only for the government but also for his party and the young left-wing coalition: “He is the kidney” of that , which eventually became the Broad Front. And for the Democratic Revolution, resignation means that its leader, its most important face and who, in his view, articulated this political project, ends up leaving in a rather undignified way: he enters politics through the front door and eventually leaves, at least temporarily – I emphasize temporarily – through the small door. Because, apart from the fact that there is no evidence to suggest that he has committed any acts of corruption, he presents himself as the face associated with the Agreements for the Public case.”
And he adds: “Perhaps the worst thing is that a major, monumental crisis is imminent that will affect the Democratic Revolution and the party does not have the people who could handle this crisis.” That is the big drama. What should come now is a very thorough introspection, a very thorough analysis of what happened, why the government lost control of extremely sensitive situations, and why the crisis was not dealt with in time to prevent a major bleed.
Political analyst María José Naudon agrees that the manner in which Jackson left the Department of Social Development makes it “a defeat for the government” at first glance, but also, as she notes, “a defeat ” be triumph for the right”. . “This reading, however, is not enough. Added to the dignified narrative, which has all the possibilities, is Jackson’s functional and challenging narrative. That is the key. He and his generation propose this resignation as Understanding victims in terms of a greater good: the agreements.” Seen in this way – adds Naudon – his dignity, his coherence and his convictions are reaffirmed. For them, this crisis turns into a heroic act, demanded and provoked by the villains : the right. Corruption takes a backseat in this game. If this works, in the long run (and this generation has a long future in politics) it can become a significant milestone in a victory story.
That will be put to the test from next week when Boric tries to restart the government movement with Vallejo but now without Jackson.