President Boric is open to improving the Constitution, which must be submitted to a popular consultation

Chileans must decide through a popular consultation, on September 4, if they approve or reject the Magna Carta written over a year. President Gabriel Boric received a copy of the text last Tuesday. A day later, the young president expressed his openness to “make improvements” to the constitutional text. She said it after the former president Ricardo Lagos considered that the country “needs and deserves a Constitution” negotiated and that, “sooner rather than later, will allow us to stop debating about it in order to live within it”. Lagos’s words had a strong political impact when the official campaign is about to begin with a view to a plebiscite that, according to the latest polls, would favor the “rejection” option, as it will appear on the ballots.

“I think what the former president is saying is very respectable given his track record,” Boric said. The convention was dominated by the left. The right lacked the right to veto and, in this context, voices began to emerge in favor of a more balanced text. What was not expected was the tone of Lagos.

Despite his heritage social democrat, Lagos supported the leftist Boric in the second electoral round that took him to the Palacio de La Moneda and prevented the victory of the extreme right embodied by Felipe Kast. He is also a leader who maintains part of the prestige accumulated during his government at the beginning of the century. A few hours after the ceremony in which the constitutional text reached the hands of the current head of state, Lagos published a letter that has not gone unnoticed because he stressed that none of the alternatives put into play by the September referendum is at the height of challenges. Therefore, it takes “continue the constitutional debate until reaching a Constitution that interprets the majority of Chilean men and women”.

For the former president, “a constitution cannot be partisan“In that sense, he estimated that the constituent process will not end with the plebiscite, in case the “yes” to the new Charter is defeated. The current Constitution, he added, “is also unable to arouse that support, since the power veto of supportive sectors of the absent or subsidiary state every time they sought to reform it.” For the portal El Desconcierto, Lagos has tipped him “a hard thrust to the expectations of the Approval.” His letter, “was read as a win on the rightbecause although it does not add to the Rejection (yet), it subtracts from the Approval”.

Chile deserves a Constitution that achieves consensus. As none of the 2 texts that may result from the plebiscite have it, the political challenge is to continue with the constitutional debate until reaching a Constitution that interprets the majority https://t.co/RQ6WNiAZ65 pic.twitter.com/IkR3pz6Ese

– Ricardo Lagos E. (@RicardoLagos) July 5, 2022

Bori’s response

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“If the Constitution is approved, improvements must be made, as the president of the Convention pointed out yesterday, as Gaspar Domínguez pointed out, I myself as president of the Republic agree that this provision must be made,” said Boric. But, at the same time, he warned about the political costs of a victory for the promoters of “Rejection.” If the “no” to the new Magna Carta won “we must depend on the historical veto that the right has had in the last 30 years to make substantive reforms to the Constitution.” Boric recalled, however, that “the two options that are at stake on September 4 are legitimate.” “It is the people who will have to decide. Our role as a Government is that all Chileans vote informed. And hopefully there will be a high-minded debate.”

The latest surveys also confirm that more than half of the population does not know the content of the new constitutional text. A recent poll by the consulting firm Criteria shows that the Assembly that drafted the Constitution has a disapproval rate of 57%. 49% are inclined to reject the Magna Carta. Questioned about the possible result of the plebiscite, 41% believe, however, that Approval will win and 40% that Rejection will prevail.

We all have something to write in the history of our country. Let us meet in a democratic dialogue around the proposal for a new Constitution. This September 4, #ChileVoteInformed

🌐 https://t.co/m74sBiCJsr pic.twitter.com/KOhpuwS38b

– Presidency of Chile (@Presidencia_cl) July 5, 2022