In the house of the Socialist Party, the Secretary General, Camilo Escalona, is in his office with a few cups of tea and cookies preparing the campaigns and programmatic bases of the United for Chile list, which will compete on May 7 for the seats of Constitutional Advisors . A much less hectic week in the political sphere due to the fires that hit the south of the country.
He turns off the air conditioning because it has already begun to feel cold inside his office. She sits down, they bring her some papers to sign while she partner with his fellow party members. The previous week was full of negotiations within the PS, now, he says, that the negotiations are different, since they meet for hours and hours with allies who are not used to negotiating so internally. Even with the Communist Party, which he reveals for years, they do not have this level of closeness.
Despite the fact that the table is now made up of new members, he hopes that the Todo por Chile parties will be successful in their electoral campaign. However, he assumes that the fact of not appearing on a single list is inexplicable to him. The political costs that this electoral division can bring-he says-is “evaluated in the long term”. Now, that the campaign designs have begun, he is confident that the two ruling party lists will generate a bloc within the constituent process and that the campaign process must have the utmost respect among the lists.
-Which list do you think has the best projection in terms of electoral performance? United for Chile or All for Chile?
I’m not interested in that rivalry. I think we have to look at it with a sense of complementarity rather than a fight in which they try to settle what someone called the “two souls.” I don’t like those words. Do you know why I don’t like it? They remind me of Jaime Guzmán, when he divided the opposition in 1983 with the same words. He brings back bad memories. If in 1983, Pinochet’s weakest moment, the opposition had been united and had raised a political proposal without exclusions, we probably would have saved ourselves a lot of suffering and six years of dictatorship. I don’t like to demonize anyone. I believe that the unity list for Chile will have great support and I believe that the Todo por Chile list will do its thing and hopefully they will have great support.
-Did it cause noise that characters from the old politics were candidates to write the new Constitution? What is the argument behind this selection of candidates?
-There aren’t that many. I believe that there are reasons for great politics and micropolitics as in all things. In our case, the socialists, I understand they are basically three figures. Ricardo Núñez, Marcelo Schilling and Sadi Melo. Núñez’s idea came from our regional Atacama, not in the leadership. That speaks well of Núñez and his work as a senator for 20 years. I think he didn’t look for it, but he has a vocation as a socialist and hasn’t stopped being one. The same with the case of Marcelo Schilling, who is making a great personal effort. In the case of the Metropolitan Region, with Sadi Melo, I think we have rescued a very significant popular representative. I applaud Sadi, former mayor of El Bosque, because the party has always tried to underestimate his contribution and he has been practically at the heart of the popular world for 30 years. So, do we have to be represented by those with three or four professional degrees and doctorates? Can’t a former mayor of the popular world who has been in contact with the people for 30 years represent the PS? Does it have to represent us only technocrats? Can’t the people, who have worked all these years in the towns, be a candidate? Are they banned? That is the underlying problem. They don’t have big names, they say, what are the big names? Who has the authority to define the big names?
-Do they say that now something similar to what happened with Giovanna Grandón (Aunt Pikachú) is happening at the Constitutional Convention?
-Of course, this is what prejudices that try to undermine people look like. I recently read Mr. Warken, from the Yellows, saying that now we tend to “privilege what was the UP.” With what authority does he say it? Are you threatening us? Do you want to justify the right-wing alternative that he joined with that caricature? Does he want to pave the way for a 21st century Pinochet, disqualifying us with the image of the UP? You have to be very careful to eat fish, because you can get stuck.
-How has the communication with Approved Dignity been?
-We did not have a relationship like the one we have formed with CS, RD, Comunes, FREVS, even with the Communists. It has been many years since we had spent hours and hours looking for how to reach agreements. Just yesterday, Wednesday, we had a first conversation about how to start addressing campaign issues. There are no agreements yet and we hope that in the second half of February the dialogues on coordination will prosper. The programmatic bases that were drawn up before the formation of the two lists are already in place. For these programmatic bases, all the technicians participated, all of them, also the parties that are in Todos por Chile. That is the strange thing, that regarding the contents there was no difference, they are long-term contents on the Constitution that Chile must have for the next 50 years. That seems incomprehensible to me, that regarding the contents we had full agreement but if we had full agreement regarding the contents, why couldn’t we go on a list?
-What explanation do you give to that?
-The prejudices. Atavisms of the cold war reappear, like the one that tries to revive Warken. Why don’t they say that there is no Soviet Union now and that there is a far-right nationalist government in Russia? Why don’t they say that and try to revive ghosts that no longer make sense? So, we had these programmatic bases, which we are going to defend and we are going to make them known because it is a full agreement of the forces that participated in the reaction of those bases and with those we are going to work to give meaning to that effort.
-So the participation of Bachelet would be subject to the dialogue that arises with United for Chile?
-Of all forces. I grew up working in a collective spirit. Excuse me for bringing up the years, but in 1972, when I was a candidate for the Federation of Secondary Students of Santiago, I was not a candidate for the Socialist Youth, I was a candidate for the left. We have always worked together, so we must be able to put the purposes of the group as the main issue. I understand that today’s society is essentially media-oriented and wants to go after names, but ideas are also fundamental. Convictions are decisive, sometimes we have to act on convictions, someday.
– Do you think that up to now they have not acted in accordance with convictions?
-No, I think so. I believe that we have been managing to act based on convictions, such as having a new Constitution. It was what made President Boric take all the risks he has taken. The concessions that were made with the right were made on the basis of a fundamental conviction, that a new Constitution was necessary to close a cycle after 50 years of the coup. There have been convictions. That path must be strengthened.
– Regarding that path and after the week of intense negotiations, don’t you think that the collective spirit was diminished by the fact of going on two lists and now having to compete electorally? Do you think there will be friction?
– I believe that the candidacies should not face each other. For example, we are not going to pit Sadi Melo against Carmen Frei. Towards her, we will maintain an unalterable respect. We are going to seek the support of our social base. We are not going to seek to attack anyone.
– But is there a greater distance today than there was before the subject of the lists? You said that there was an agreement regarding the main contents. How do you explain then that there are two lists?
Yeah, well, I can’t explain it to myself. I worked for that and suddenly the perspective was not possible to materialize. I think that in any case we must not lose sight of the fact that our adversary, on the other side of the path, will always be the ones who installed and maintained the subsidiary State for these 50 years, today grouped under the formula of Chile Vamos. They are a little scared by the competition they have from the PDG and the Republicans. We must not lose sight of the fact that they always make us fight among ourselves. They always look for us to touch our ears, after we touch our ears, we move on to insults. I think we have to avoid that.
– Do you trust that these two lists act as a block within the constituent process?
Yes, I think so later. What happens is that the Republican Party is an unknown phenomenon in Chile. We have a deeply conservative traditional right, who could deny it. But, in addition, to his right, a far-right extremist expression arose and, in between, an authoritarian populist group emerged, that of Parisi. So, if we are not able to come to an agreement in the face of these new manifestations, which reflect the deep crisis that exists in the idea in the contemporary world, because the fact that societies do not know where they are going is an international phenomenon. They start towards extremist positions, far-right and far-left. So, if we are not able to act together, then we better dissolve the parties. In other words, the basics of politics is knowing how to act together.
-During the past week there was talk about the different options that the PS had and that Paulina Vodanovic, the president of the party, in case of going on two lists, preferred to align herself with Democratic Socialism. On the other hand, you were the promoter of being together with Approve Dignity…
-No, I was the advocate of going on a single list. I never left the institutional position of the party.
-But did this difference bring political costs within the party?
-I think we are too intoxicated with the theory of political costs. Here we all think about the costs that the things that one does bring. I don’t think things can be seen in such a short term. What I observe is that, in the long line, compañero Elizalde is valued in the PS because he was right, supporting Boric without conditions. It would have been unpresentable to have asked for issues, positions, quotas. It was a success. At this table, he is valued in the game, because he managed to revive a game that was asleep, gone. In other words, this table has made the PS a protagonist. That is the fundamental thing, that is why that is going to measure you. Not because of the differences that could have occurred during this period.
-In that line, how important was aligning yourself with the President?
-I feel that as a responsibility that comes spontaneously from the depths. They always tell me that I have the UP too much in mind. I don’t know why they criticize me for having a good memory. I saw that we did not make every effort to support Allende and that was fatal. So the need to support the President, everything we can support him, arises in me deeply. The stability of the President is also the democratic stability of the Country. Some say no because costs are paid, we are intoxicated with that, they are measuring costs all the time. Politics is not that. I believe that what most dignifies Socialism today is supporting the president, fulfilling the commitment to support him without conditions so that his government is fruitful, so that the country overcomes the great difficulties in which he arrived at the Presidency of the Republic that today are unknown and so that we can start the pending transformations. They are not going to be completed, but they have to start now.
– Do you think that this support that the PS is giving to the President translates into more presence in the Government?
-No, I think we have a very important presence to think about making it even bigger. Always, in internal discussions, I review the positions we have and I see that the Socialists have more presence than we had with compañero Allende. In other words, we have an impressive number of figures in the ministry. I really think it would be misplaced for us to be nudging to try to expand our presence in government. I understand the comrades in the regions that our presence in the regions is weak. But that is up to the ministries to create better balances.
