During the afternoon of this Saturday, President Gabriel Boric held a first working meeting with Paulina Saball, who will be in charge of the reconstruction process of the areas affected by fires. A social worker by profession, active in the PPD and a long political career linked to the former Concertación and former Nueva Mayoría, Saball served as Undersecretary for Housing in the first government of former President Michelle Bachelet, and as minister of the portfolio during the entire second management of the former President, with whom he maintains a close relationship.
Precisely, in the middle of a press point, the head of state had finished highlighting part of the curriculum of the newly appointed person in charge of reconstruction in the south-central zone of the country, when he stopped to look at her and remember: “The President wrote to greet me and congratulate me on your appointment, President Bachelet sends you many greetings”.
In this sense, the President affirmed that “I have no doubt that with his tremendous career and with his knowledge in addition to the State, he will be a great contribution in the experience of design, management of public policies, and also, in the administration of Catastrophes Chile is a country in which we frequently experience catastrophes of this type and Paulina has extensive experience in the fires in Valparaíso, in 2017 in the Maule, in the continuity of the reconstruction process of the Coquimbo earthquake of 2015, so all that experience is going to be put to the benefit of the people who need it”.
In this regard, grateful to be summoned for this task, Saball assured that she will put the best of her experience at the service of the task entrusted by President Boric, in order to articulate a construction plan that is participatory, pertinent, early and efficient, and that allows communities to live better. “Each situation is unique, each territory is unique, each community is unique. Therefore, although we have previous experience, the important thing today is to have a link with each of the communities, each of the municipalities, with each of the regional governments,” said the former minister.
Finally, Saball added that “this is a task that requires the effort of many, and my role is going to be fundamentally to articulate, try to baste and sew the threads so that together we all form a network that allows us to sustain this reconstruction process in which there is no one left over, we are all necessary, each experience, each resource, each task and each contribution will be necessary”.
“The priority is still putting out the fire”
The President reported that the reconstruction work is only one of the three priority axes that the Government has defined for the areas affected by accidents. “The first is to put out the fire and that is what we are doing today, the second is early aid, so that people can have emergency housing as soon as possible, the voucher to be able to buy items that they need more quickly, and the aid that is coordinating Undersecretary Perales, which also have to be territorially relevant,” he said.
And he reiterated: “I want to remember that the first priority today is still to put out the fire and in that sense I want to insist on the call for responsibility. Today we had an unfortunate accident, a plane crashed in the context of fighting the fires in Hualqui, Fortunately, the pilot is seriously injured, but he is stable, he is fine, he survived, and we send a big hug to him and his family.”
Finally, President Boric maintained that responsibility is tremendously important. “I ask you please not to let our guard down and pay attention to the people who are working in the field,” he concluded.
