Race tightens in countdown to Sunday’s vote

Marco Enriquez-Ominami (MEO), the maverick presidential candidate who placed third in last December 13’s presidential election with a stunning 20 percent of the popular vote, officially gave his support Wednesday to the beleaguered campaign of Sen. Eduardo Frei.

Frei, the second place finisher in last month’s race and who is the candidate for the center-left “Concertacion” political coalition that has governed Chile the past 19 years, received a disappointing 29 percent of the vote in December. He faces-off this Sunday with front-runner billionaire businessman Sebastián Piñera, who received 44 percent of the vote.

The Santiago Times will cover tonight’s debate with a live, English-language blog analysis (open to the public) led by commentators Patricio Navia, Montserrat Nicolas and Bill Stott

Rightist billionaire businessman Sebastián Piñera and center-left candidate (and former president) Sen. Eduardo Frei face-off this Monday evening in their first and only national debate since the Dec. 13 first-round vote eliminated Communist Party candidate Jorge Arrate and independent candidate Marco Enriquez Ominami (MEO).

Both Piñera and Frei have targeted the 20 percent of the vote won by MEO, an independent 36-year-old deputy who pilloried both Pinera and Frei as “relics of the past.” MEO painted Frei as an out of touch, old-guard politico content with cutting deals with other old-guard party leaders to return in power, and Pinera as a case study of why the gap between Chile’s rich and poor is one of the most notorious in Latin America.
Pinera won 45 percent of the vote on Dec. 13, Frei 29 percent and Arrate seven percent.

On Sunday evening Chile’s two presidential hopefuls – billionaire businessman Sebastian Piñera and Sen. Eduardo Frei – began airing five-minute TV spots designed to win votes for the January 17 run-off presidential election. The spots will run through January 14.

Piñera won 45 percent of the vote in the first vote held Dec. 13, 2009, while Frei won 30 percent. 

The new TV spots for both candidates will be aimed at supporters of the third-place finisher in last December’s vote – maverick, progressive Dep. Marco Enriquez-Ominami (MEO).

Like the aftermath of any party, last Sunday´s elections have left a lot to clean up; political propaganda still covers most Chilean streets.

And the political propaganda won´t be taken down, says Association of Chilean Cities (ACHM) President Claudio Arriagada, because most cities can’t afford to do it.

Billionaire businessman Sebastian Piñera took a giant step forward in his quest to become Chile’s first elected rightist president since 1958 by winning 44 percent of the vote in Sunday’s presidential sweepstakes.

Sen. Eduardo Frei, the candidate for the center-left Concertaciòn political coalition that has ruled Chile since its return to democracy in 1990, finished second with 30 percent of the vote, followed by maverick independent candidate Marco Enriquez-Ominami (MEO) with 20 percent and far-left candidate Jorge Arrate with 6 percent.