A few days ago, the independent constituent in the PS and Andres Cruz, said that there is an attitude of exclusion on the part of some conventional towards his right-wing colleagues. False, said the president of the Constitutional Convention, Elisa Loncón, and in passing replied to the summons made to her by another conventional, Marcela Cubillos —of the UDI— whom she invited to read and “decolonize to stop looking at the other as their threat.”
In a conversation with El Mercurio, Loncon clarified that in the former Congress “we are president and vice president who, as a constitutional matter, led the Convention. But we are enexpanding and we already have seven new Vice-Presidents for the plurality of the Convention. So,” he added, “for them to say that this president is marginalizing the rest is that they are not valuing the real gestures. They’ve been very me, and I respect them, and also the support I’ve received.
In this regard, the president of the Constitutional Convention stressed that work is being done with sign language and that it is intended to install interpreters of Aymara, Rapanuí, Mapuche, Quechua, in addition to incorporating the Yagán language, Kawésqar in the communication protocol.
To the latter would be added a complete capsule in mapudungun so that, in Loncon’s words, “the Mapuche who are in the community, the mother of us, our grandparents, can hear that their language is important because our language was punished as a dialect that did not serve. That linguistic pluralism has to be constitutional.”
Loncon was asked if she would tell certain Mapuche groups that they have other options to “fight for their claims.” The Mapuche constituent replied: “It is not my purpose at this time. I am working on the Constitution. I don’t have mandela’s standard at the moment to ask for the guns to be lowered. I think the Attorney General’s Office has to investigate, the government has to show signs of involvement.”
On the other hand, he said that “not everyone is privileged” in politics. “There are those who are in a political position without being from the privileged classes, because a constituent told me, ‘hey, but my dad is a fisherman.’ I’m referring to the political sector of privilege, not the social class constituent who told me that and her story is similar to mine, maybe.”
Regarding this interview with the morning, the constituent Cubillos did not save anything and pointed to the words of Loncon, assuring that she refuses to condemn the violence and that she “insists” on the discourse of the class struggle.
“President Elisa Loncón in El Mercurio refuses to condemn the violence and insists on her speech of class struggle,” the former education minister said, labeling the Mapuche constituent in the publication.
Loncón replied on the social network: “Limited analysis Marcela, I invite you to read and decolonize in practice to stop looking at the other as you threaten.”
Limited analysis @marcela I invite you to read and decolonize yourself in practice to stop looking at the other as you threaten.
— Elisa Loncon – Mapuche Constituent (@ElisaLoncon) August 1, 2021
Cubillos did not stay and added: “You see and describe as a threat anyone who does not think like you. I hope to take a stand, too, in the face of the attempted cancellation and censure of democratically elected Jorge Arancibia.” This, in reference to the fact that relatives of victims of the dictatorship called for the departure of constituent Jorge Arancibia — also from the UDI — from the Human Rights Commission of the Constitutional Convention because he is a former commander of the Navy and former aide-de-camp of dictator Augusto Pinochet.
