Top > World > 2006 > January > 2006-01-17

First Female President Elected in Chile

With 97 percent of voting sites reporting in Chile, Socialist Party candidate Michelle Bachelet had won 53 percent of the vote to about 47 percent for billionaire businessman Sebastian Pi?era. This means that Bachelet, a political prisoner during General Augusto Pinochet`s military dictatorship in Chile and a single mother of three, was elected president on Sunday, making her the first woman to lead a country long considered one of the most culturally traditional in Latin America.

Bachelet`s victory will keep the Socialist Party in the presidential palace for four more years, following the presidency of Ricardo Lagos. When Lagos won the 2000 election, it was the first time a Socialist had held the seat in Chile since 1973, when Pinochet overthrew the government of Salvador Allende. What followed was a 17-year dictatorship, marked by widespread human rights violations.

"You know that I have not had an easy life, but who has had an easy life?" Bachelet told supporters Sunday night during a victory speech in downtown Santiago. "Violence entered my life, destroying what I loved. Because I was a victim of hate, I have dedicated my life to turn that hate into understanding, into tolerance and, why not say it, into love."