The Chilean Senate rejected Thursday, November 19, for lack of a quorum, a constitutional reform project aimed at reserving seats for representatives of indigenous peoples in the future Constituent Convention responsible for drafting the new Constitution.
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The project, already approved by the Chamber of Deputies, aimed at securing 24 seats for representatives of indigenous peoples, mainly of the Mapuche ethnic group, obtained 24 votes for and 15 against, but it would have taken 26 votes to reach the necessary quorum of 3/5.
It will now be submitted to a "
mixed commission
", made up of senators and deputies, which will have to reach an agreement.
The main differences relate to the number of reserved seats and whether or not they are added to the 155 members that will be included in the future Convention, made up entirely of elected citizens.
"
If we do not reach an agreement, a new Constitution will be written without the indigenous peoples,
" Social Development Minister Karla Rubilar warned on Tuesday.
Native Americans make up 12.8% of the 18 million Chileans.
The Mapuche are the majority indigenous people, with 1.7 million people, or 80% of the country's indigenous people.
The Chileans approved at the end of October by referendum a change of the Constitution to replace the current one inherited from the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990), one of the demands of the social uprising that arose in October 2019 for more social justice.
The country must elect on April 11, 2021 the 155 members of this constituent assembly responsible for drafting the new Basic Law.
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