Chile Socialist Leading Presidential Race
By BY EDUARDO GALLARDO Associated Press Writer
© 2006 The Associated Press
SANTIAGO, Chile — Chile appeared to be following Latin America's increasingly leftward tilt, with a socialist pediatrician holding a solid lead over her conservative multimillionaire opponent in early returns Sunday in the country's presidential race.
If the results hold, Michelle Bachelet _ a political prisoner during the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet and later defense minister for a center-left government _ would become Chile's first female president. Her victory would extend the rule of the center left coalition that has governed since the end of Pinochet's 1973-90 rule.
With 67 percent of some 8 million votes counted, Bachelet received 53 percent to nearly 47 percent for Sebastian Pinera, according to official returns announced by the government.
Sunday's runoff was necessary after a Dec. 11. election involving four candidates failed to produce a winner with a majority. Bachelet had nearly 46 percent and Pinera 25 percent.
President Ricardo Lagos, who deftly balanced his socialist ideology with market-oriented economics to win an approval rating above 70 percent, was constitutionally barred from seeking immediate re-election. As he voted, his backers chanted "2010," referring to the next election.
Both Bachelet and Pinera, a Harvard-trained economist who pioneered the credit-card business in Chile, called Sunday's election "a great day" as they voted at separate schools in the same upper-class neighborhood in the capital, Santiago.
Despite their different political backgrounds and ideologies, both candidates outlined similar basic goals, promising to continue the two-decade-old free-market policies that have made Chile's economy one of the strongest in South America.
Bachelet, 54, and Pinera, 56, also said they would fight to lower the 8 percent unemployment rate. Pinera promised to create 1 million new jobs in his four-year term, 100,000 in the first year alone.
Both also pledged to improve public health, housing and education and to curb rising urban crime. They also promised to reform Chile's 25-year-old privatized social security system to ensure better pensions for retirees, though neither gave details of how.
Pinera, whose fortune is estimated at $1 billion, campaigned on a promise to drastically reduce the poverty that affects nearly one-fifth of Chile's 16 million people.
He said he would loosen labor laws to encourage more hiring, while Bachelet said she would stress efforts to reduce inequities between the rich and the poor.
Latin American voters have been turning to leftist candidates in presidential elections, most recently in Bolivia, where the Indian activist Evo Morales won a surprisingly easy victory and takes office next Sunday.
Pinera warned during the campaign that the leftward tilt was a problem and said Chile's new leader would have "to face this with firmness and defend Chile's interests with energy." Bachelet, however, stressed that the new leaders have all been elected and said that "Chile must have relationships with all of them."
Bachelet and the outgoing president belong to the same Socialist Party as President Salvador Allende, whose leftist policies prompted Pinochet's bloody coup in 1973.
But the party allied with major left-center parties in 1990 to defeat the right in an election, and their moderate coalition has held while leading Chile into a free-trade pact with the United States, cutting inflation and fostering growth of about 6 percent a year.
Pinochet, who dominated Chilean political life for a generation, was not a factor in the campaign, and his spokesman, retired Gen. Guillermo Garin, said the former leader paid little attention to it.
At 90, Pinochet is ailing and was only recently freed from house arrest. He faces charges of human rights abuses and corruption stemming from his 17-year rule.
Michelle Bachelet at a TV debate in October 2005


Michelle Bachelet became Chile's first elected female President Sunday when her rival, Sebastian Piñera, conceded defeat after trailing by six points.
Bachelet, a member of the center-left group Concertación, previously served as both Health Minister and Defense Minister.

Outgoing President Ricardo Lagos called it a "historic day" and phoned Bachelet to congratulate her.

At 21:30 local time (00:30 UTC of Monday), Bachelet has said: 
::''"Who had ever thought, my friends? Who thought 20, 10 or 5 years ago that Chile would elect a woman as a President? That became possible, because the citizens wanted it to. Thank you, Chile, thank you for your millions of votes. (...) My commitment as President of Chile will be to walk along you one more stretch in this big Avenue of Freedom we have been opening"''

Ms. Bachelet supporters are reportedly celebrating her victory.