“Dos Chiles tras el sismo”<\/a><\/p>\nEarthquake Unveils Hidden Chile<\/b>
Jorge Ramos
March 8, 2010<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not about the 8.8 magnitude earthquake that has split Chile into two. What happened is that the earthquake has uncovered the reality of two Chiles. The first Chile is the one marketed abroad : modern, avant-garde, industrious , a country of free trade agreements, an almost first world nation. The other one is the Chile that wasn\u2019t invite to the party, the one who didn\u2019t board the development bus , the home for those ignored by the residents of the Mint Palace (Chile\u2019s Presidential Palace) and the intact skyscrapers of capital Santiago.<\/p>\n
This is the \u2018primitive Chile\u2019 , according to diplomat and writer Jorge Edwards. It has always been there, he commented, but not many noticed it, until the earthquake shook off the veil . The best evidence of the existence of two Chiles emerged during the riots in the city of Concepci\u00f3n a few hours after the earthquake. The violence caught everyone by surprise . Thousands of Chileans from the ignored Chile felt disconnected and completely isolated from the rest of the country and the central government. They went to the streets to sack shops and supermarkets. Some of them were after food for their families . Others took advantage of the chaos and stole Plasma TVs and refrigerators in a city that didn\u2019t even have electricity. No wonder many Chileans were horrified at the thefts and looting. But, like the filmmaker Jorge Ulla commented, poverty cannot be hidden . <\/p>\n
In Chile, as the rest of Latin America, the richest ten percent of the population earns more than half of the nation\u2019s income. The poor continue to be terribly poor, and can barely survive. These poor people were the ones who complained of the absence of aid. They were the ones who were attacked by the army when the president Michelle Bachelet finally decided to send soldiers to control the disturbances a few days later. I can understand her hesitation in making that decision. The army has not attacked the people ever since the cruel era of General Augusto Pinochet . Even Bachelet\u2019s own father died during the dictatorship. It was not an easy decision, but she hesitated too long. That was her first mistake. <\/p>\n
Chilean\u2019s fear towards the army seems hereditary. It\u2019s as though it has been passed down from generation to generation through their genes. I have never seen a Latin American country respect their army so much. \u201cNot even a bird flies without authorization\u201d a military told me. He wasn\u2019t joking. The journalists had to submit. We could only enter Concepci\u00f3n with a safe-conduct permit from the military. The curfew only allowed people go out from their houses for six hours a day to look for water and food. However, sometimes this was an impossible task. It was incredible to see that almost every business and office closed for days in the second biggest city of the country. <\/p>\n
The second mistake was Bachelet\u2019s government not warning the inhabitants of the towns on the southern coast the risk of a tsunami after Saturday\u2019s earthquake. The army had already admitted their mistake. But it was tragic that many lives were lost because of bureaucratic inefficiency. The Third mistake was that Chiles\u2019 reputation of self- reliance crumbled a few days after the earthquake. A government official stated that offers of international aid would be studied. But he mentioned nothing about accepting them. The vague and inept response stopped international aid when lives could be saved, and the populations in the most affected areas could receive help.<\/p>\n
President Bachelet did not say anything about the minister\u2019s statement and it took her six days to clarify that Chile never turned down international aid. I suppose that the sight of Peruvian President Alan Garcia offering help — in spite of the two countries\u2019 long-standing maritime disputes and historical tensions – was too difficult for Chile\u2019s politicians to swallow . But these are extraordinary moments. <\/p>\n
The Fourth mistake was that the aid did not go to the people most affected by the earthquake. I talked to many people in the city who lost their homes, who were living on the streets, and hadn\u2019t received a single piece of bread . This made the president\u2019s earlier statement that there had been no interruption in food and gasoline provisions seem utterly absurd . If Bachelet walked a few blocks without bodyguards, she would realize that this was not true. <\/p>\n
The fifth mistake was Bachelet\u2019s paralysis in the Mint Palace . The earthquake overwhelmed Bachelet. The Chileans wanted her to be in control of the situation. But, she delayed to visit the worst hit towns and cities. Mind you , she was a good president in normal times but not during times of crisis.<\/p>\n
Now, it\u2019s the new president Sebastian Pi\u00f1era\u2019s turn, to fulfill the expectations of the people. His mission, he said, is not about rebuilding the country, but to rebuild it better. And it\u2019s true. Chile\u2019s fundamental problems are not the cracks caused by the earthquake or the cities destroyed by the Tsunami. The fundamental problem is that some people kept pace with modernity, but did not realize that millions of their countrymen were left behind, without hope, and without a way to catch up. With the collision of tectonic plates, the Chilean society may foresee what is to come. If the tension caused by inequality is not relieved , then the next problem might be greater. Pi\u00f1era\u2019s challenge will be to unite two Chiles into one. If he doesn\u2019t, the country runs the risk of experiencing a shock even greater than the Feb. 27 quake. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Translated by Karen Chang The ST is from Jorge Ramos\u2019 recent article \u201cDos Chiles Tras el Sismo,\u201d first published in March 2010, after the Chilean earthquake. The article is an opinion article that examines the underlying social problems such as inequality and poverty in Chile. The ST belongs to a hybrid genre within the written […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":64,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[720,4094,155,642],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-analysis","category-chile","category-news","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/64"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":103,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17\/revisions\/103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/span401\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}