36-year former student union leader Gabriel Boric was sworn in as Chile’s youngest president on Friday.
It comes after he won 56% of the vote in a December runoff against conservative Jose Antonio Kast.
“The country has to get back on its feet, grow and distribute the fruits of its growth in a just way,” Boric said in his first speech as president from the balcony of the La Moneda Presidential Palace in the capital, Santiago.
“When there’s no wealth distribution when wealth is concentrated in the hands of only a few, it’s very difficult to have peace,” he said. “We need to redistribute the wealth that Chileans produce.”
On the Constitution, he said his government will “decidedly” support the convention as constitution writers advance on the charter. He added that the document has to represent the entire country, including women and indigenous communities.
“We need a Constitution that unites us and that we can call ours. A Constitution that, unlike the one that was forced on us with fire, blood and fraud during the dictatorship, is born in democracy,” he said.
