Via El Desconcierto
With more than a million votes, Gabriel Boric won the presidential primaries. With the exception of La Araucanía, Boric won in every region of the country.
Neither he, nor the winner of Chile Vamos, were the favorites in this Sunday’s presidential primaries. However, Gabriel Boric was elected candidate with more than 1 million votes, and a surprising 60% of the preferences.
The deputy for Magallanes and Social Convergence activist outpolled his pact competitor, Daniel Jadue. The latter obtained 39% of the votes in a poll that began to show a preference for the frenteamplista candidate, even from the first table counted in the school where Gabriel Boric votes.
At his command headquarters, the now presidential candidate of Apruebo Dignidad took the stage to thank those who were present at his campaign work, as well as all those who represent him. “We also want to thank the people of Chile, who have been fighting for so long to be able to have a dignified life. Something as simple as a dignified life, but that this model has constantly denied them,” he said in his speech.
“We want to share this joy with you, which I don’t know how to express, I want to convey the sense of responsibility that we all have on our shoulders (…) Today it is my turn to be at the forefront of this, but the responsibility to change Chile is collective,” the candidate continued.
In his speech, Gabriel Boric took the opportunity to greet his competitor in the primaries, Communist Mayor Daniel Jadue, and took the opportunity to extend a commitment to work together on his candidacy between now and the first round in November. “We ratified our pact and our alliance to be able to govern,” he explained.
He also called “those who still doubt, those who have been fighting for many years to change the model: here you will find open doors in a candidacy that knows how to listen.”
To close his speech, Gabriel Boric paraphrased Salvador Allende’s final speech, adding to it glimpses of decentralization and gender equality. “Sooner or later, in all the regions of Chile, the great Alamedas will open, where men and women can pass freely to build a better society,” he closed.
The regions that raised Boric
Without a doubt, the support that the Apruebo Dignidad candidate received from the regions helped him to overcome Daniel Jadue in the polls. Gabriel Boric, the only one of the contenders who was not born in the capital, used regionalism to his advantage to get the necessary votes from the extreme areas of the country.
With the exception of the Araucanía region, the candidate of the Frente Amplio prevailed in these primaries. The place where he got the most votes was in the region where he is from: Magallanes. There, Gabriel Boric got three times more votes than Daniel Jadue, and in total he got more votes than all the Chile Vamos candidates combined.
The only region where there was a closer parity was Ñuble. There, Sebastián Sichel got about 800 fewer votes than the winner of Abruebo Dignidad.
In the Metropolitan Region, Boric managed to win in almost all the communes against the Chile Digno candidate, Daniel Jadue. Most emblematic for the mayor: Recoleta, the now former candidate managed to win with difficulty against Gabriel Boric.
