Speech on Receiving an Award from the Republic of Chile
Trinity College Dublin, 14th January, 2016
Canciller,
Embajador,
Miembros del Cuerpo Diplomático,
Distinguidos invitados,
Queridos amigos,
Queridos adherentes de la democracia,
Es un enorme honor para mí dar la bienvenida al Canciller Muñoz a Irlanda. Estoy encantado de tener esta oportunidad para reflejar sobre uno de los más hermosos momentos de mi vida política, pero sobre todo para rendir homenaje al pueblo de Chile y su compromiso con la democracia y los derechos humanos.
It is a great honour to welcome Foreign Minister Muñoz to Ireland. I am particularly delighted to have the opportunity to reflect with him on one of the most moving events of my political life, the opportunity of engaging with the Chilean people in conditions of dictatorship. I so clearly, and with the greatest affection, recall the arrival of those Chilean families fleeing persecution and death. I recall with special affection Hugo Ramirez and Resa; those families in Shannon and Galway. Later there would be my participation with other concerned parliamentarians, travelling at their own initiative, without State support, in an international election observation mission to Chile in 1988, and to pay tribute to the people of Chile and to their commitment to democracy and human rights.
It was my immense privilege to bear witness to the momentous vote of the Chilean people on the 5th of October 1988. I, along with my then political colleagues - TD Pat McCartan, Senators Shane Ross and Joe O’Toole - travelled in our different ways to Chile, we were not funded by the Government or parliamentary structures of the time. We were among hundreds of international election observers invited by the Association of International Parliamentarians for Democracy in Chile, whose Secretary-General Ricardo Lagos would later go on to be a President of Chile.
I travelled out a week in advance and indeed, as I was the first International Observer to arrive, on 22nd September, I became known as Observador Uno. I remember holding a press conference which was widely attended and while some press had headlines such as 'El Retorno de O'Higgins el Mercuro' editorialised on the terrible things a person such as myself might be expected to write about Chile.
As the map for allocations of International Observers was blank I volunteered for one of the more remote areas, Punto Arenas. I stayed at the house of Roberto Lara and his wife Liliana Soucarret Romer and during my stay visited Bishop Tomas Gonzalez, an opponent of the dictatorship, and in whose church a bomb had been placed by supporters of the dictatorship. He, a friend of the poor, brought me to visit families of those who were oppressed, including the Secretary of the No Campaign who had lost his job after 30 years service with the National Petroleum Company, because he supported the No campaign.
On that historic occasion of 5th October 1988, with their No vote after a campaign under the slogan 'Chile, La Alegria ya viene' the people of Chile, in enormous numbers, affirmed in full voice their deeply held commitment to political freedom and brought about the beginning of the end of over 15 years of military dictatorship. In Punto Arenas where I was located, where one in four of those employed worked for the military the vote was delivered at 6.50 am- Sí 3,879, No 4,892. Nationally of over 7 million votes cast, almost 4 million voted, No (54.7 per cent) just about 3 million voted Yes (43 per cent). I had the privilege of witnessing a people choosing a path based on an old respect for values of decency, democracy and human rights and the future possibilities it created.
I did indeed write about my experience and if I may recall with a little extract from my diary of that time, what I wrote of these events in 1988.
"At the entrance to the town of La Hermida is a little shrine to a fifteen-year-old boy whose nickname was Pete. There had been a confrontation here on the day Pinochet was named by the military as their candidate, and Pete had been killed.
His mother, Rebecca, a small woman with striking brown eyes, sits in her neat house under a wall-hanging of Salvador Allende. Every second word she speaks is of oppression. At the edge of the poplación there is a circus of the North American variety. It is a Pinochet initiative directed against the 'subversion' of native or popular culture such as that championed by Violetta Parra as the tortured and executed Victor Jara.
Outside the tent a bear is being fed, but most people are watching a condor with a rope around its neck.
The condor is the mystical black eagle of the Andes. An Andean ceremony involves the ritual tying of a condor to a bull's back; when it has gorged itself on the hapless beast, the bird is released and soars to a height of four thousand meters. It is a horrific image, but I cannot get out of mind the parallel with the role of the military in Latin American society - an elite whose prestige and power has been sucked from the life-blood of the people. They are worse than vultures.
As the day of the plebiscite nears, there are more demonstrations. Near the Plaza de Armas, the mothers and wives of the tortured and disappeared - Madres de Los Desparicidos - are placing posters on the wall. When the army arrive, the soldiers pull down the posters.
The women continue to protest. Some are dragged away by the hair. The literature asks: 'Me tortiraron, me asesinaron, me despaeciron, me olvidastea? ('Should the tortured, the disappeared, the assassinated be forgotten?'.) One of the women becomes involved in an argument with two female office workers - 'Momias' - who talk of discipline.
The television cameras are first to arrive on the scene, followed by the tank housing the water cannon, which sprays contaminated water mixed with chemicals and acid on the demonstrators. This is how Pinochet deals with the opposition.
At the Carcel Pública - the public prison - there is talk of a hunger strike. It is just past midday when the gas is released here; we all run into the doorway of a block of flats. An old woman, her daughter and two young children are handing out salt and bits of lemon. The gas is being used indiscriminately, and it gets into everyone's eyes, even those who are some distance away from the main protest.
In the doorway, the photo press are coughing, except for those who have come prepared with World War II-style gas masks. An old woman weeps softly: 'For fifteen years it's the same.' The water tank approaches, the soldiers alight from the truck, and the children are almost knocked down. His mother grabs Jorge, and I carry Lionel up to the landing and out of immediate danger.
Later in the week, I revisit Lo Hermida to talk at greater length with Rebecca, and to visit Olla Commones; the communal cooking places, like soup kitchens, from which the poorer families are fed. Last night I heard Pinochet say 'I am middle class, Lucia [his wife] is middle class. The middle class is the biggest class.' I had heard this one before: has Mrs. Thatcher, the General's greatest fan, not said something similar? In Rebecca's case, everybody is poor.
Rebecca talks of her son Pedro Mariquo, known as 'Pelluco'. On 1 May 1984, he went to Park O'Higgins, where a demonstration was taking place. He was in good spirits, she tells me. He came home and, after eating, was playing football. Some local youths had lit a fire. A police patrol car came. Four men got out, and one fired three shots. The first bullet lodged in Pelluco's back and the second in his neck; the third grazed his head.
By 10:30 pm he was dead.
She relates the events, and her attempts to get justice, without emotion, and also describes the subsequent harassment of her daughter Antoinetta and her son José Christian. She ends firmly with the statement: 'They will never break me.' She is wearing a 'No' badge. I leave her to her work.
The final 'Rally for the No' takes place on the Saturday before the vote. One point two million people fill the streets. la Alegría is coming close. On Sunday, the 'Sí' campaign has its final rally - more a cavalcade of cars. The rich, and those who aspire to be rich, are on the side of Pinochet. Against them are the poor and those who value democracy."
Let me say, in the presence of distinguished diplomats, how I can still not understand how the dictatorship was supported, overtly and covertly, by so many administrations, how its opponents were allowed to be abused, even murdered. Then too, we should reflect on the role of Professor Friedman and Los Muchachos de Chicago in supporting the economic model of the dictatorship, of using the Chilean people, their children, as a laboratory for a mechanistic and ideologically driven extreme version of market theory.
Mr. Foreign Minister, during the years which have passed since that momentous day in 1988 we in Ireland have followed, with interest and admiration, your country's progress as a truly democratic republic grounded in a true respect for human rights and a set of political choices that place the common good at their heart.
I am honoured to be among the international recipients of this recognition from the Government of Chile. I would like to pay tribute to those humane, courageous men and women of the international community in Santiago who in 1973 opened their embassies to Chilean refugees, people like the then Swedish Ambassador to Chile, Harald Edelstam, who was consequently declared persona non grata by the junta and expelled from the country.
I commend Chile for honouring the memory, in a most practical way, of its refugees by its current policy of welcoming Syrian refugees. Who among us can afford to forget our humanity, to forget the open doors that were ours to walk through to sanctuary when we or those of our people needed it?
I recall too the extraordinary work carried out by Irish missionaries in Chile during the darkest years of the dictatorship, and I am delighted that they have been also honoured with this award. Throughout the 17 years of military dictatorship, the Columban Fathers coordinated their efforts with the Vicariate of Solidarity which was set up by the then Cardinal Archbishop of Santiago, Raúl Silva Henriquez, to offer refuge and support to victims of human rights violations. They also participated actively in the anti-torture movement, Sebastian Acevedo, named for the man who burned himself alive to protest the torture of his son by secret police.
Tragically, the Columban Fathers suffered terrorism themselves, and very directly, when their house was stormed in 1975, resulting in the murder of their housekeeper, Henriquetta Reyes, and the detention and torture of Dr. Sheila Cassidy. Two Irish Columban priests, Fr. Brendan Ford and Fr. Desmond McGillicuddy, were ultimately expelled by the junta in 1983 – amongst other things for running a “politically oriented soup kitchen”, as it was reportedly described by police at the time.
The actions, I have mentioned, of those courageous Irish priests in Chile are emblematic of the selfless work of Irish missionaries around the world as they seek to protect the dispossessed and underprivileged. Beir Beannacht orthu go deo.
I had the happy opportunity to return to Chile in 2012 as President of Ireland 24 years after the plebiscite of 1988. I was welcomed by President Piñera, and had the privilege of meeting Patricio Aylwin. While there I visited the Museum of Memory and Human Rights as well as the home of Pablo Neruda on Isla Negra. Even as I reflected in those hallowed places on the tragedy of the lives lost and shattered, 3,000 murdered, 3,000 disappeared, tens of thousands tortured, raped and abused. I recalled the dignity, energy and hope I encountered when I first visited in 1988. It was wonderful to see in 2012 that the dignity, hope and energy of 1988 continued to pulse through the country.
I was also privileged to meet, once again, Joan Jara widow of Victor Jara who so generously put his great artistic gifts and, ultimately, his life at the service of our common humanity. I spoke, on that occasion, of how passion for justice cannot be halted by torture, or censure, or even murder. It is that passion that must remain at the heart of any society that claims to be about the task of building a real Republic.
As with all true democracies, Chile continues to face the challenges of deepening democracy, in new global conditions each generation charged with the ethical remembrance of past struggles as they continue to build and develop a democracy which began life as a courageous vision. That is something we are deeply aware of here in Ireland in this year of important commemoration, as we reflect on the inspiring words of our Proclamation of Independence and remember the men and women who fought for a free Irish state and a democratic republic.
Chile’s defence and development of democracy is important for its own people, but it also has a resonance beyond its borders. In that spirit I express my gratitude to Chile for the example it gives the world of respect for human rights, promotion of sustainable human development and a socially inclusive model of economic governance.
We are at a crucial moment in world history, when we are confronted with many great challenges – climate change, the urgency of sustainable development, global poverty, new conflicts and historical levels of displacement – all of which demand urgent and comprehensive solutions. These solutions will only be found if we have the courage to seek out new methods of inquiry and policy-making, new ways of working together, and new models of economics and politics. In so many of these areas, the exciting and necessary thinking is at this moment emerging from South America. In an interdependent world, we have much to learn from each other, and everything to gain from closer and deeper cooperation.
Muchísima gracias, Canciller Muñoz, por este profundo honor que en verdad pertenece al pueblo Chileno por el espíritu democrático que expresó en 1988 (mil novecientos ochenta y ocho).
[Thank you, Foreign Minister Muñoz, for this profound honour which in truth belongs to the Chilean people for the democratic spirit they expressed in 1988]