Brazil & Southern Cone - 28 September 2004

With just over a month to go before regional elections, Chile's rightwing opposition, Alianza por Chile, is eager to turn the media spotlight away from the prosecution of retired General Augusto Pinochet and on to more electorally-fertile ground: law and order. More specifically, they wish to highlight the Concertación government's failure to tackle a steadily rising tide of violent crime. A set of crime statistics published on 23 September appears to help their cause: reports of serious crime are up 9.8% in the second quarter. However, since Chile's rising crime rate coincides with the implementation of a new justice system, the figures are not as clear-cut as they may appear.

Nationwide, reports of serious crime, such as murder, rape and robbery with violence, were up by 9.8% in the second quarter of 2004, compared with the same period of 2003. Rape was up 31%, robbery with intimidation up 15.5% and robbery with violence up 13.5%. However, most arrests in the second quarter were as arrests of theft (61.4%), actual bodily harm (17.8%) and robbery with force (11%). Arrests related to serious crime offences were down by 15.7% on the same period of 2003.

The government remained upbeat about the figures. The subsecretary of the interior ministry, Jorge Correa Sutil, claimed that the rise in reported crime was due to the greater confidence people had in the police and judiciary, especially in areas of the country where the new justice system was already in place; reports of crime there were up 10% on the same period of 2003. Correa argued that second quarter crime rates were always higher than first quarter figures and the statistics just published showed that the government had been successful in slowing the rise. 'This year crime has increased less. In 2003 crime increased by 25% (compared with 2002), and this year the rise was only 10%,' he said.

Others put a different gloss on the figures. Gonzalo Vargas, the director of the citizens' peace foundation, said the rise 'was not solely due to an increase in confidence, but also to an increase in the level of delinquency, among other reasons.' 

The leader of Alianza por Chile, Joaquin Laví­n, did not use the statistics to score points, perhaps mindful of the fact that, as mayor of Santiago, he bears some responsibility for the city's position at number two in the rankings of areas with the highest reported crime rate. Seizing on the fact that crime in the city was down 3.21% in the second quarter of 2004 compared with 2003, he commented, 'serious and profound work has been done and for me the most important thing has been that all the authorities; the ministry of the interior, the city council and the police have worked as a team and for the same side'. 

However, Laví­n and his APC colleagues have been more aggressive on another law and order issue: pardons. According to the opposition, in the last five years the government has pardoned 235 prisoners, 60% of whom have been sentenced for drug-related offences. 'President Lagos is always asking in public what kind of Chile do we want, and the Chile that we don't want is one where drug-traffickers get off scot-free and the President of the Republic refuses to give any explanation,' Andrés Chadwick, a senator from the rightwing Unión Demócrata Independiente (UDI) party, said.

The government says these numbers include reductions in sentences and the pardoning of fines. None of those convicted of drug-related crimes, the government claims, served a shorter sentence; their only benefits were limited to fine pardons or reductions. Keen to avoid appearing weak on crime, José Miguel Insulza, the interior minister, pointed to an increase in the number of prisons and a reduction in such benefits as day release and parole. Insulza has also proposed toughening the laws on drug-trafficking by confiscating the property of such criminals.