The president of the Chamber of Deputies, Raúl Soto (PPD), described the incident that marked the first visit of the government – in a delegation headed by the Minister of the Interior, Izkia Siches – to Araucanía as a “complex event”. “What the government chose is the most difficult path, but the correct one,” said the parliamentarian, who also considered that “they were guilty of voluntarism,” but that the important thing is to learn and improve coordination.
The parliamentarian, in an interview with The Mercury, considered the objective behind a form or survey that Segrpes – led by Minister Giorgio Jackson – delivered to deputies and senators to find out the legislative priorities they consider relevant reasonable, although he stated that “I do not know if the mechanism was the most appropriate for the moment. One also hopes from the beginning to generate trust. I have met with Minister Jackson, with Minister Siches, but parliamentarians also need to have a process of dialogue, of communication, of generating a person-to-person bond “. Along these lines, he advocated starting a pre-legislative work.
Soto stressed that the collaborative work of the Legislative with the Executive will be done “from the full autonomy of a State power”, so “The Government cannot pretend to control the Chamber’s agenda, I want to be super clear on that. We have all the will to collaborate and have coordination with the Executive, but always from our autonomy”.
The president of the Lower House acknowledged that building majorities is difficult in Congress, especially among deputies, and that “Consensus and agreements are going to be built project by project, here there is not going to be a permanent majority that is availableeverything is so fragmented that it will have to be built project by project”.
Asked about the statements of Deputy Karol Cariola, who said that nothing essential to the government program can be changed, the parliamentarian emphasized that “no government program is written in stone and it is clear that reality is making things have to keep changing. And the construction of the agreements that are going to be required for the implementation of those proposals as well. You have to have certain important degrees of flexibility”.
Regarding the relationship with the Christian Democracy, his former party, he maintained that “the DC has another domicile. They are completely outside the Government, but if we manage to consolidate ourselves, I think we have to talk again.” Also, Soto did not close the door to putting pension fund withdrawal projects on the table, arguing that his role is to allow all debates to take place.
