‘Still a lot of pain’: Dictatorship victims haunt Chile election

Antofagasta, Chile – Samuel Burgos Espejo was just a child when soldiers killed his older brother, one of the victims of a 1973-1990 Chilean dictatorship that saw thousands of dissidents tortured, executed and forcibly disappeared. “There is still a lot of pain.” Over 1,200 disappeared For Burgos Espejo and many other Chileans, memories of the dictatorship have come to the forefront during the election campaign. While the dead cannot vote, when Chileans cast their ballots, the voters’ lists will include names of people detained and disappeared during Pinochet’s dictatorship with a note: “person absent due to enforced disappearance.” The National Electoral Service, SERVEL, which implemented the move this year, said recognising the detained and disappeared on the electoral roll is an act of “civic memory”. “It was obvious they wanted to disappear him like they did to so many victims,” Burgos Espejo said on Tuesday while waiting for Gabriel Boric’s arrival in the northern city of Antofagasta, where some supporters in the crowd held “No To Fascism” signs in reference to Kast. “Boric tries to have a discourse toward the future, but Kast’s discourse is to the past.” Meanwhile, many families of the dictatorship’s victims are still seeking the whole truth of what happened, searching for the disappeared, and fighting for justice – and to them, Kast represents a dangerous return to the past.