IM NOT FAMILIAR WITH CHILE'S POLITICAL PROBLEMS....NOT IN DEPTH ANYWAY.....

SO CAN SOMEBODY IN LESS THAN 1 PARAGRAPH AND BASIC INFO LET ME KNOW WHAT WENT ON WITH THE COUNTRY

Fantastico !!!!!  Esperamos q sea un cambio para un mejor Chile, y que ella sea apoyada por

su gobierno, pues sin ese apoyo, es capaz q los "Pinochet Dinosaurs" le hagan la vida

presidensial imposible. Como individuo, como mujer, como madre q es, y como profesional, es

lo q se necesita para sacar adelante la microeconomia de Chile a un nivel "modelo" para el

resto de Centro y Sur america.     BRAVO !!!

She's actually the 6th female president in latin america's history.

Daeveed is happy; and when Daeveed is happy, Daeveed smiles.

LaDyBuG wrote:

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HER NAME IS: MICHELLE BACHELET 1 ST FEMALE PRESIDENT OF CHILE 54 YEAR OLD PHYSICIAN HAS 3 KIDS CAN SOMEONE POST OF A PIC OF HER?

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I think this is GREAT!!!

This is her:

     

Posted on Sun, Jan. 15, 2006

Chile elects 1st female president; analysts see big change for region
By Jack Chang
Knight Ridder Newspapers

SANTIAGO, Chile - Voters in this booming Andean country elected their first woman president, Michelle Bachelet, in a Sunday run-off victory that added to a rising wave of women leaders in Latin America.

The 54-year-old physician, who served as health and then defense minister under popular outgoing President Ricardo Lagos, won 53.51 percent of votes, based on results from 97.52 percent of voting sites.

Billionaire businessman Sebastian Pinera won 46.48 percent of votes and conceded defeat early Sunday night.

Speaking to thousands of people who filled the Alameda, Santiago's main street, Bachelet thanked Chileans for making history Sunday night and promised to use her mandate to usher in "a new style of government" marked by a "new relationship between the representatives and the represented."

She also paid emotional homage to her father, Alberto Bachelet, an air force general who died in 1974 after he was detained by the country's military dictatorship. Bachelet's mother and three children joined her onstage.

"Who would have imagined 10, 20, even five years ago that Chile would elect a woman president?" she asked with a voice hoarse from months of campaigning. "This is not a triumph of one person, of one party, of one coalition. Chile has won again like it has every time."

Analysts said her win signaled a fundamental political shift in a country known as one of the Western Hemisphere's most conservative countries, where traditional religious values closely guide public policy.

Bachelet has said she is an atheist. She has been long separated from her husband and has raised her three children largely on her own. She also speaks five languages and has studied in the United States and Germany.

She was imprisoned and tortured during the early years of Gen. Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship and lived in European exile in the late-1970s.

"This will bring about enormous amounts of change that people aren't even aware of yet," said Marta Lagos, regional head of the public research firm MORI. "This will be a government like her candidacy, more direct, more transparent, more people-oriented."

Bachelet is the second woman to be elected head of state in South American history. The voters of tiny Guyana elected Janet Jagan, widow of longtime President Cheddi Jagan, in 1997.

"That a woman who is separated, was tortured and exiled now becomes the president of Chile is really incredible," said Heraldo Munoz, Chile's ambassador to the United Nations and a Bachelet supporter. "This will truly have an impact in Latin America."

Bachelet joins a recent surge of women politicians in Latin America who have succeeded in national politics despite traditional male control over political and economic power.

In neighboring Argentina, first lady Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner won a hard-fought race for a Senate seat last October and regularly outshines her husband, President Nestor Kirchner, on the national scene.

In Peru, former congresswoman Lourdes Flores is running a close race against nationalist candidate Ollanta Humala for her country's presidency.

"Women represent change in a region where politicians are viewed with suspicion," said Joseph Ramos, dean of the school of economics at the University of Chile and a longtime Latin American policy expert.

Bachelet based her campaign largely on internal issues such as boosting education and reforming the country's pension system. She also argued for more gender equality in Chilean society and pledged to appoint just as many men as women to her Cabinet.

With Chile's economy posting 6 percent growth last year, Bachelet has promised to continue Lagos' outward-looking economic policies, stressing foreign investment and bilateral trade agreements.

Many credit those policies with pulling the country of 18 million people out of economic recession in 1999. Chile's economy also has benefited from high world prices for copper, its biggest export.

Bachelet's victory extended the center-left Concertacion coalition's nearly 16-year hold on the presidency. Bachelet, like the outgoing President Lagos, hails from Chile's Socialist Party, a Concertacion member.

Bachelet will take power March 11 with Concertacion majorities in both houses of Congress, the first time in the coalition's history, largely due to constitutional reforms that eliminated designated military senators.

"The coalition no longer needs to negotiate with the opposition, which can be a source of danger," Ramos said. "Differences are sure to emerge within this coalition."

While conceding defeat Sunday, Pinera struck a conciliatory tone and said his conservative Alliance for Chile coalition was ready to work with Concertacion legislators. He appeared alongside Bachelet at her campaign headquarters about an hour later.

Bachelet was elected for a four-year term and cannot serve consecutive terms.

She previously came in first among four presidential candidates in a general election, but fell short of a majority of votes that would have given her the presidency outright then.

Several Chileans who voted for Bachelet Sunday said they supported her because of her ties to Lagos, whose popularity rating was more than 70 percent.

"I support the continuation of this very good government," said Jose Trancoso Mesa