Chile: Thousands of students march again for quality education
rto-msa/pa/jlv/dg, Univision (via AFP), Monday August 8 2011: Tens of thousands of people protested for the fifth time in less than two months in [the Chilean capital] Santiago to demand better public education, in a demonstration which this time was authorised by the government and which once again resulted in incidents with the police.
The multitudinous march – 60,000 people according to the police, 100,000 according to the organisers – brought together students, teachers, parents and workers of other professions, such as those of the copper industry, and public servants in Santiago.
Other cities like Valparaíso and Concepción joined the protest.
Dressed in their uniforms, carrying placards which read “education is dying of hunger”, in fancy dress or dancing, the demonstrators walked several kilometres through the central Alameda Avenue and neighbouring streets to finish up in the central Almagro Square.
“I'm marching because I have two children and I can't get by, they are going to finish indebted for many years and I don't want that for them. I'm asking the president to put his hand on his heart understand that people cannot pay the loans”, said Graciela Hernández, one of the demonstrators, to AFP.
The march began on the outskirts of the University of Santiago (in the east of the city) and advanced for several blocks of Alameda Avenue, the main artery of central Santiago, but it diverted to the south before passing in front of the government house.
Residents of houses near the route accompanied the students with cacerolazos [banging pots and pans in protest] and throwing water to refresh them, on a spring day in Santiago.
The peaceful tone changed almost at the end of the demonstration, when a group of hooded individuals confronted police officers with rocks and poles around the central Bulnes Walk, mere metres from the presidential palace of La Moneda.
Likewise scenes of vandalism were seen in which hooded people attacked traffic lights and traffic signs.
Special forces officers dispersed the demonstrators with jets of water tear gas. In the middle of the revolts the burning of a car and the stoning of buildings were recorded, the AFP verified.
The incidents lasted for several minutes and contrasted with the mostly peaceful character of the demonstration.
Before the start various points of Santiago were blockaded by means of barriers topped with burning tyres, which caused traffic jams.
The demonstration was authorised by the government and its route agreed with students and teachers, contrary to that which occurred the previous Thursday, when the police prevented demonstrators from marching and arrested more than 800 people.
With this gesture the students displayed flexibility and the government its openness to resume dialogue through occasional meetings with the youth.
The students' calls [for protest] have been the most massive since the return to democracy in Chile in 1990 after 17 years of the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, whose regime reduced public spending on education by at least half and promoted its privatisation.
In answer to the protests, the government has made two proposals: First, a Grand National Education Accord (GANE), and then a 21-point programme.
Both proposals have been described as “insufficient” by students, who demand free university education for those who cannot pay for it, that the state take responsibility for the quality of education and that private universities should be not-for-profit.
“The government does not listen to us, we want a new education [system] in Chile and the government's proposals do not respond to what we want. The demonstrations are going to continue, come what may, until the government gives us better education,” assured Manuel Soto, a protester from the University of Santiago.
Student leaders have called anew on Chileans for a cacerolazo this Tuesday afternoon in support of their demands – a typical protest of the Pinochet dictatorship era which is re-emerging two decades after the end of his regime.
Translated by James Tweedie (tweedie.james@gmail.com)