Experts say José Antonio Kast able to ‘reactivate a dormant Pinochetism’ and warn more education needed on ‘horrors of dictatorship’
C
onfident in his popularity, the Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet called a plebiscite in 1988 asking the population whether they approved extending his 15-year-long bloody rule for a further eight years.
A young José Antonio Kast, then a 22-year-old law student, joined the yes campaign, saying in a TV advert that he was convinced the regime was acting “for the direct benefit of all of us young people”.
Pinochet ultimately lost and left power in 1990, but Kast never stopped openly supporting the dictator, both as a congressman and in the three presidential bids he made before being elected last Sunday.
