Posted on 12/11/2005 4:32:15 PM PST by Alter Kaker
SANTIAGO, Chile (Reuters) - Socialist Michelle Bachelet led Chile's presidential elections on Sunday but had not won enough votes to avoid a potentially tight January run-off, probably against rightist candidate Sebastian Pinera.
With more than half of votes counted, the government Electoral Service said Bachelet had 45.68 percent, trailed by rightist opposition candidate Pinera with 25.83 percent. Experts and officials said a run-off was almost certain.
If elected Bachelet, a separated mother of three who was tortured and exiled during Chile's 17-year dictatorship, will become Chile's first woman president.
Joaquin Lavin, another candidate from Chile's divided conservatives who have been out of power since the end of Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship in 1990, had 23.32 percent of votes.
Tomas Hirsch, from the far-left, had 5.15 percent of the vote.
If victorious, Bachelet will be the fourth consecutive leader from Chile's center-left coalition, which has cut poverty by half and overseen Chile's transformation into the region's star economy.
Bachelet, a former defense minister, has pledged to overhaul Chile's private pension system and continue the liberal social programs and free-market economic policies of her mentor, President Ricardo Lagos.
Support for an agnostic, separated woman like Bachelet shows a dramatic shift in values in this traditionally conservative and Roman Catholic country of 16 million people where divorce was legalized only last year and where "machismo" or male chauvinism is strong.
APPLAUSE FOR PINERA
Supporters at Pinera headquarters burst into applause when early results were announced, anticipating their candidate would go to a second round against Bachelet.
"This means more Chileans want a change," Pinera campaign chief Rodrigo Hinzpeter told reporters.
"It seems like the second (round) is going to be between Michelle Bachelet and Sebastian Pinera," Foreign Relations Minister Ignacio Walker said at the convention center where results were announced.
Political scientist Patricio Navia cautioned that Bachelet would have a tough fight in the second round.
"This is not good news for Bachelet," he said, noting that the total combined votes for the two right wing candidates exceeded those for Bachelet.
But analysts have also said that not all Lavin supporters could be counted on to vote for Pinera in a second round and that Bachelet will probably draw many Hirsch supporters in January.
A CHANCE TO MAKE HISTORY
Chileans lined up under a blazing summer sun to vote on Sunday and Red Cross workers helped voters who collapsed in the heat while standing in long lines.
"I decided to vote in these elections because it is a historic event where for the first time ever there is a great chance of a woman being elected president," said Luis Oliva, a 19-year-old who voted for the first time in Renca, a working-class neighborhood of Santiago.
"I wanted to be a player in writing Chile's future history," he said, dressed in jeans and t-shirt.
(Additional reporting by Froilan Romero and Louise Egan)
Beware the "uh, duh, I'm voting for the woman because she a woman and we've never had a woman" crowd.
Actually, the great hero Pinochet is the one responsible for Chile becoming a star economy.
"I decided to vote in these elections because it is a historic event where for the first time ever there is a great chance of a woman being elected president,"
----
Yes, put a socialist in control, just to have a woman President -- sounds just like our STUCK-ON-STUPID Thugocrats!!! Deja vu.
Pinochet and that private pension system she wants to "reform" are responsible.
shame
With each passing day, I grow more convinced of Churhcill's remark that "the best arguement against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter."
I often recall the story of the voter who, in 1964, told a reporter that she was voting for Lyndon Johnson because Barry Goldwater was going to take away her TV. When the reporter pointed out that what Goldwater actually wanted to do was abolish the Tennessee Valley Authority, she paused, looked back at him, and responded, "Well, I'm not going to take any chances."
South America has reverted to the 70s while we jerk around in Iraq. All the triumphs of the 80s are being overturned and we will soon be surrounded by 20 Cubas.
I love that anecdote!
Sad, but true.
Don't cry for me, Chile.
So a good economy excuses human rights abuses and torture? You know the German economy was pretty good under Hitler too.
You deny that there were torture and human rights abuses in Chile under Pinochet?
Communists don't deserve rights.
Where is that in the constitution/bill of rights?
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