The president of Empresas CMPC, Luis Felipe Gazitúa, attended this Thursday the Business Meeting of La Araucanía (Enela) 2022, at the Dreams Casino in Temuco. In that context, he addressed the draft of the new Constitution and the theft of wood in the region.
“80% of Chile wants a new Constitution, we all have to agree, beyond the content of what has been drafted,” Gazitúa said at the event.
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“The work that is being done in these months has to be conducive to this new Constitution really tending to unite Chileans. What one can see in the positions of the public defenders of the new Constitution, and the detractors, is that this is not happening,” the businessman added.
“The concern of citizens, the private world, politicians, has to be in order to achieve that goal in the next two months,” he added.
Situation in La Araucanía and theft of wood
“The situation we have in La Araucanía is extremely serious. It is not reasonable what the governor has said, the list of deceased, the dead that we have. I believe that the central problem of this region is the problem of security,” Gazitúa said.
In addition, he related that “last week I was invited to a presentation with students from the Adolfo University and they asked me how much the conflict cost. And I said very loose of body: 100 million dollars.”
He also pointed out that “here is a business of wood theft, the forest industry has been robbed of 100 million dollars of wood in recent years, that gives for many things. There is drug trafficking, car theft, those things are not normal.”
“I know you all think we bought it. I will explain in two words: 80% of what is stolen is pine, and we do not buy pine, because two thirds of the pine is used to make wood, and we do not buy pine to make wood, we buy pine waste to make cellulose, “he added.
“There are more than a thousand sawmills distributed throughout Chile, of all sizes that process stolen wood,” he emphasized.
“I can’t rule out that they won’t put us in a stolen wood truck, but we have to pay a price for standard wood. We cannot buy at a discount. People believe that we buy wood at a discount. We, being a very relevant industry with buyer, are regulated. We have to pay everyone the same price,” he added.
Alfredo Moreno criticizes constitutional proposal
Also present at the hearing was the former Minister of Public Works, Alfredo Moreno, criticized the draft of the new Constitution, indicating that it says “that there are rights, and not say what they are.”
“For example, to say that peoples have the right to the lands they have traditionally occupied, what is the meaning in Spanish of that phrase? Which lands?” he said.
Temuco Mayor Calls for “Deep Reading” of New Constitution
The mayor of Temuco, Roberto Neira, also addressed the draft of the new Constitution and called for “deeply reading” the text.
In that line, he urged a “studied vote”, relieving that the plebiscite has a historical character. “Let’s live up to that debate, and not fake news,” he said.
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