Mayor Rodolfo Carter has control of the media in his hand and he won’t let go. The last thing this week was the crowded demolition operation, in which the fourth narco-house in La Florida fell to the ground. The measure confronted him with the neighbors who explained to the community chief that drug traffickers did not live in that house, but a lady who rented it and sold empanadas. While the crane destroyed the house, Carter left the place in the middle of the cameras and the morning crews, opening a new controversy that today celebrates its second day and only increases.
The Carter case demonstrates that institutional crises and distrust in authority are opening a space for political figures who come up with innovative ideas and excessive speeches in the public environment. Proof of this is that even the National Prosecutor, Ángel Valencia, as soon as the narco-house operation was found out the same Tuesday, came out to celebrate the measure, saying that “the initiatives of the different State agents who aim to combat drug trafficking effectively.
But hours after Valencia’s words became known, it was learned this Wednesday that the Public Ministry had opened a summary against the prosecutor who sent the information to identify the “narco-houses” and, before this, Carter counterattacked saying that it was a telephone call from the Government to the Prosecutor’s Office, which motivated the summary, to harm their electoral chances: “No one changes their mind in eight hours. There was a phone call here. The Government can no longer deal with its contradictions”.
The entire episode continued with a harsh question to La Moneda: “President Boric, this is not the FECH election, it is not the slutty election of a student federation. Here is the life of human beings,” he said.
In the midst of all this controversy, the Prosecutor’s Office had to mediate saying that the summary was activated to determine how it came into Carter’s hands the document that specified the addresses of the houses to be demolished, not to investigate the legality of the measure. In any case, the mayor of Florida did not miss the opportunity to show off his stinging and conceited speech: “We were prepared to face shots from drug traffickers, we were not prepared for a shot in the back from the National Prosecutor.”
From the Government, the deployment for the narco-casa case was total and the ministers of Justice, the Interior, the spokeswoman and President Boric himself, in less than 24 hours, to refer to the issue. Carolina Tohá said: “We do not have any controversy and we have not made any phone calls.” Camila Vallejo, for her part, pointed out that “I am not going to take charge of unfounded and false accusations.” To end with the President himself clarifying: ” The Prosecutor’s Office is an autonomous entity, there has been no call from the Government, but also, I am concerned, as a Government, to fight against crime, against drug trafficking and not against the mayor, so I am not interested in that fight ” .
The confusion only increased when the pro-government deputy and president of the Chamber of Deputies and Deputies, Vlado Mirosevic, in conversation with Radio Dune, celebrated what was done by the community chief of La Florida and called on the “progressive mayors” to implement the same measure. The explanation: “That they continue there, untouchable, is a monument to impunity. They are castles of those who believe they are feudal lords in our towns”. Simultaneously, the The mayor of Antofagasta, Jonathan Velásquez (independent, former Evópoli), stated that he will implement the same measure in his territory and warned that several municipalities look favorably on the destruction of “narco-houses.”
Absence of State
For the lawyer and researcher of the Institute of Society Studies (IES)Rodrigo Perez de Arce, This type of leadership arises from the difficulties that the system has in providing an immediate solution to the problems that most concern people today, which are drug trafficking and violence. “If the political system continues to be incapable of solving problems of this type, it is leaving the table set for a leadership similar to that of Bukele,” he says, referring to Nayib Bukele, the current president of El Salvador and who intends to perpetuate himself in power by disobeying to the other powers of the State, supported by the high popularity that he has achieved by confronting the maras, gangs of juvenile delinquents that he has locked up en masse in special jails.
The specialist warns that the big question of why these speeches are so prolific lies in the ineffectiveness of the traditional political system to face the security problem. “ToGiven the ideas that are out of the box and that are considered crazy, they will become more attractive ”and, keeping the proportions, he compares this case with what happened during the pandemic with the withdrawals of the AFPs.
Doctor of Political Philosophy and author of the book The Chilean populist momentCristóbal Bellolio, He stresses that this measure could be classified as populist, because “one aspect of the populist discourse is the idea that political action must be immediate, it must be fast and we don’t have to waste time either in commissions or in deliberation.” That is why –says the expert– that “many times the Rule of Law is stressed and that is what some are criticizing in some way today”.
At the beginning of the week, when three demolitions of the “narco-houses” had already been carried out, the Plaza Pública Cadem survey revealed that the mayor of Florida is the second best-evaluated political figure in the country, after Evelyn Matthei and before of former President Michelle Bachelet. Being even more specific, the UDD Citizen Panel survey found that 88% of the sample agreed with the measure to demolish these houses. Yes Carter manages to come out of the criticism and questioning of this week, this new episode could elevate him even higher in the polls.
