Chilean President Faces 1st Large Student Protest
Tens of thousands of students protested in Chile on Thursday in the
first march demanding education reform since President Michelle Bachelet
took power on promises of deep changes.
The students marched through the streets of downtown Santiago heading to
La Moneda presidential palace in a mostly peaceful protest that was
marred at the end by hooded vandals who infiltrated the demonstrations
to clash with police throwing rocks and petrol bombs. About 1,800 police
officers guarded the march to avoid more violence. Student leaders
estimated the crowd at 100,000 but police said it was closer to 40,000
people.
Bachelet was inaugurated for a new presidential term two months ago. She
has vowed an education overhaul funded by a corporate tax hike in
response to the millions of people who have taken part in protests since
2011 demanding deep changes to a system suffering from poor quality
public schools, unprepared teachers and expensive private universities.
Students say the government is finally on the right course after years
of staging massive marches demanding free, quality education. But they
say it's still not enough and they want to be part of the reform.
"I think these projects are aimed in the right direction, but it's
unfortunate that there is no process of participation and debate," said
Naschla Aburman, a student leader at Universidad Catolica.
The student protests began under the 2006-10 presidency of Bachelet, who
appeased some students by naming a commission including several of
their leaders, and shuffling her Cabinet. But many others were left
disappointed.
"What we've done so far is injecting more money to this same system that
segregates," said Melissa Sepulveda, a student leader at Universidad de
Chile. "This system generates one type of education for the rich and
another for the poor."
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