Salvador Allende 1970
Written: By Salvador Allende, October 11, 1970;
Source: Tricontinental, no. 21-22; February 1971;
Transcribed: David Adams, July 2023.
The electoral victory of People's Unity in Chile represents, for the first time, the ascent to power of a Latin-American people by way of the voting booth.
Never before in the republican history of the countries of Latin America has a true representative of the dispossessed classes, elected by the force of votes, directed the historic destiny of one of the nations that make up the geographic region in which the neocolonialist policy of world imperialism was born.
Since the beginning of the last century, the “divine” arrogance of the North American governors has been channeled according to the racist principle of “manifest destiny” and the interventionist policy of the Monroe Doctrine, to impose their neocolonial domination on the relations of capitalist production in Latin America.
The displacement of free market capitalism by monopolistic capitalism signified the beginning of the “era of exploitation” of the Latin-American economy by the Yankee monopolies that brought with them the conversion of the Hispanic republics into sources of raw materials for the industry of the metropolis and into profitable markets for Wall Street trade.
The economic control by the United States plutocracy over the fundamental means of production opened the doors to imperialist ideological penetration into the political scenario of lands located south of the Rio Grande, which have been “misgoverned” by their native oligarchies, faithful servants of the dollar empire that scatters the crumbs of the imperialist booty within the framework of the “inter-American system.”
The triumph of the Cuban Revolution marked the beginning of the end of imperialist hegemony on this continent of underdevelopment, convulsed by hunger, misery and the death of millions of blacks, Indians and mestizos.
The presidential election of the socialist senator Salvador Allende is one of the historic events that advances the process of the second and definitive independence of the America of Bolivar, Marti and Che.
The new Chilean president has had to confront the maneuvers of the ruling classes that are not resigned to let go of the reins of power, and try to provoke economic chaos, incite the constitutional army to a military coup, and stir up reactionary terrorism against the political personalities of People’s Unity.
In a speech made on October 11 at the plenary session of the Central Committee of the Socialist Party, which Tricontinental publishes in its entirety, the elected head of Araucanian land points out the historic mission of the People’s Unity government, which will be to put into practice an economic policy to rescue the wealth of the country from foreign exploitation and eliminate the class inequality in Chile's social structure.
A few days before he was installed in the Moneda Palace, the socialist leader, who had the support of various progressive and left parties and movements in the electoral campaign for first magistrate of the nation, issued a call to the Chilean people to remain alert and vigilant in order to defend their political victory.
Dear Socialist comrades of Chile and Santiago,
Esteemed companion and friend, Secretary-General of the Socialist Party, Senator Aniceto Rcdriguez, Comrade leaders of the Central Committee and of the regional committees of the country,
Very dear and esteemed friends and national leaders of the parties and movements that comprise People’s Unity,
Socialist members of Parliament and people’s members of Parliament, socialist governors and mayors, Members of People’s Unity:
It is a very moving and profound event for me to raise my voice in a Party meeting ending hours of work and our collective preoccupation for the future of Chile and its working masses.
For me — you must understand this well — it is a feeling of intimate, profound and strong emotion to be here speaking to you as a socialist, because I will never forget that what I am, have been and will be I owe to the Party, to the people, to the understanding of FRAP (People’s Action Front) yesterday, and today to People’s Unity — I tell you comrades — talking to you has a profound significance for me because the years that I have lived within this, the socialist family, crowd together in my memory.
Founder of the Party in Valparaiso and participating member of its first central committees, within Party life, in an expression of internal democracy, I have held all positions including — on two occasions — Secretary-General of our collectivity and deputy, minister, senator and today socialist President through the will of the people.
My friend Senator Volodia Teitelboim has done very well speaking in the name of the parties and the People’s Unity movement, and Aniceto Rodriguez in recalling our fallen comrades — I wish also this morning to recall the old-timers and render homage to a worker who has been incorporated into the Party since its birth, leader of the bakers, who has been ill for years but is here today, to say that he and his class know that this is their victory.
I render homage to the workers in the person of Isidoro Godoy, leader of the bakers.
I wish to point out, and I know that in doing so I touch a sister of ours very deeply, I wish to recall one who was the best of the best, the Secretary-General of the Party, the Senator who fell organizing the Chilean peasants. I wish to render homage to all those who have fallen, in the ever-present name of our comrade, Salomén Corbalan.
Comrades, we socialists come together after a victory which is ours but not only ours. And the Party must understand this very thoroughly and I must insist on it very strongly.
The victory that has been won is not the victory of a man; the victory that has been won is not the victory of the Socialist Party. The victory won, the victory achieved, is the victory of People’s Unity, it is Chile’s victory.
The Party has a greater responsibility, and I know that it is going to meet that responsibility because after November 4 a member from its ranks will be President. Moreover, each Party member, its old members, its adults, its generous and sacrificing women, its tough youngsters of the Socialist Youth Federation, must understand that this is an extraordinary responsibility. That, as Aniceto Rodriguez has said, it goes beyond the frontiers of the nation. That there is a responsibility in the common victory of the People’s Unity. This responsibility must grow in each member of our collective.
We must be the most united, we must be the most sacrificing, we must be the example in the fulfillment of duties, we must show an unshakable morality; in summary, we must be socialists in the service of the people and in the service of the Chilean revolution.
Only thus, only thus can we answer the confidence given us by other parties and movements that are a part of the People’s Unity. They also had the right to have one of their members carry the banner of the people. They had the responsibility, sufficient breadth and democratic practice to place this banner, which is the hope of the fatherland, in the hands of one of your men. Because of this the socialists must understand the supreme responsibility implied in having triumphed and in having the fundamental base of this victory in one of your men who has contributed to the formation of a consciousness throughout Chile in his 37 years of life within the Socialist Party.
Comrades, this being my thought as I stand here before you, I wish to single out some recent political events. Before the Party now, and tomorrow always before the people, I will tell you, in the form of a fraternal and responsible dialogue, all that is happening in this country and the projections our action as governor can achieve in the international field.
I wish to say that the meeting of the 4th of September ended following exemplary and extraordinary behavior by the people of Santiago and the people of Chile — yes, because 200000 or more people assembled the night of the 4th from Arica to Magallanes, from the mountains to the sea, and thousands and thousands of men and women of the people also gaily celebrated their victory, their own victory, which is also our victory — and we did so with a lofty feeling of patriotism, and we did it with an exemplary attitude, and we did it without arrogance, we did it, more than anything else, with responsibility.
And this is what will give the people the strength to be able to say as well that we had this attitude, that we did not and will not cease to have it, because if the legal channels seem fully opened, there are still the obstinate who are trying to prevent our victory. But let them be aware that this serenity is not to disarm the people, that this tranquility is the tranquility of those who are strong, it is the firmness of those who know how and when they must proceed.
With a people like the people of Chile, it is very difficult, it is impossible that on the 4th of November the people should not enter the governor’s house with me.
The steps we have taken publicly, meaning, as comrade and friend Aniceto Rodriguez said, that People's Unity, with the people, has conversed with the Christian Democrats in order to convert into Constitutional amendments, ideas that were in our program. I say that this dialogue took place with the people's knowledge and that no one in Chile can deny that our acceptance of an attitude that we consider to be just does not imply, nor can it imply in any way, a modification in the content of the program People’s Unity puts forth.
And it is honest and it is just that the people understand that within Christian Democracy itself there were sectors that were in opposition.
But there was a majority that understood that they also had a responsibility to the people, not only because of its majority composition as a social force among the workers, but also because of the proposals formulated in the face of Chile's conscience by their candidate Senor Tomic. And this afternoon I expressed my recognition of the attitude and the political honesty of Radomiro Tomic and of the attitude taken by the leader of Christian Democracy, Senator Benjamin Prado.
But by the same token and reaffirming what Aniceto Rodriguez has said, I respectfully [exclamations from the people] — quiet comrades - and very clearly ask the Chief of State not to rush through Congress certain laws that do not have a clear explanation, just as he obtained President Alessandri’s agreement, for example, to postpone the beginning of work on Lo Prado tunnel, to resolve it finally under Frei’s governorship.
From this tribune I ask him that the project on national television not be speeded up.
I ask President Frei not to insist on the veto which implies not just nonremoval of functionaries, whose careers we are going to respect, but a limitation on the possibility of placing our own people in the vital administrative and economic centers, It is not a question of a struggle for bureaucratic posts but that the levers of the economy must be in the hands of those who are going to govern the country.
I respectfully but clearly request President Frei not to accelerate the creation of the Metropolitan Association because it is an investment in a project that the People’s Unity government must determine.
I request of President Frei that his Minister of Mines not speed up an association of mixed capital between a socialist country and Chile. This problem must be resolved by the future government, by my government, by the people’s government.
The country — Aniceto Rodriguez noted it and also Volodia Teitelboim pointed it out in greater summary — has lived through a stage, I should say, the last or next to last death rattle of the ultrareactionary right. The economic panic, the economic chaos it has tried to unleash, the illicit and cunning commerce with foreign exchange and money in order to prejudice the escudo, the failure to buy raw materials, the unnecessary sale of cattle, the difficulties in spring planting, all this underscored by one unwonted fact of Chilean political life: the direct attack on the common good endangering the life of innocent people.
How many times have we said it, how many times have we explained to the people that we would never resort to unnecessary violence nor to personal terrorism, that this is not a part of the tactics of the people.
We have seen how bombs and bombs and bombs have been placed in the face of the inefficiency of the investigatory services, and secondly in the face of an attitude on the part of Judicial Power toward these first arrested that I do not wish to analyze in depth.
I do want to say to the people that the investigatory agent who pointed out the presence of the Schillings and the Gonzalez who were first arrested, affirmed — and the pertinent authority knew of it — that from the car in which he was taken to be shown the locations where the bombs were going to be planted, they had told him that, from there they had fired on the humble guardsman who was in the service of the British Embassy.
I say to the people that we are not going to permit and will not tolerate dropping exhaustive investigations which would punish the law breakers. What would never occur is that a man of the left would attack a modest functionary. As they know, we are aware of who the culprits are and we want them to understand that we know their names, but that justice and the government of Frei have the obligation of revealing them now and not tomorrow.
Comrades, listen well to this: these seditious attitudes are not improvised. There are foreign advisers here, people with experience, mercenaries sent in to create this climate. That is where the responsibility is yours. Four hundred thousand and some votes we received in Santiago. I always said this is not just one more electoral battle. If we received 400000 and some votes, that makes 800000 eyes, 800000 ears that must be alert to tell the people of Chile and the present government who they are and where they come from.
Each one of you must meet this duty, which is not one of informing but rather is a patriotic duty to defend the country’s welfare and to prevent the attempt to wrest the people’s victory from them by cunning and cowardly means.
Comrades: a very small and impersonal chapter. I told you about it at the big meeting in the Alameda. The insolence of the reactionaries reached the point of saying that a general or admiral in the Chilean army or navy was worth 500000 dollars. I told the people: we have said and we reaffirm that we have confidence in the word of the Chilean soldier who treats our armed forces as forces that are professional and independent but responsible to the dictates of the law and the Constitution.
I know that the dignity of a Chilean soldier has no price in the market of international crime, If there are those who claim this they will meet with the answer of the people in uniform, the armed forces of the country.
For this reason — and also because they are businessmen — they said it is cheaper to eliminate Allende. Three hundred million pesos will do it.
In Valparaiso there is a Mr. Montero that I am going to tell you about, who belonged to one of the branches of the armed forces and who talked too much and said that on the 17th they are going to assassinate me in Valparaiso. I am going to Valparaiso on the 17th and Mr. Montero and his accomplices are not going to be able to accomplish their mission.
But if something should happen to me, let them understand that the people of Chile know perfectly well that I am only one of you, there is no one who is irreplaceable. And the highest homage that could be given a fallen comrade would be to continue fighting by every means possible to win the revolution and victory.
In addition to this aspect of internal policy, I have an obligation to inform the people very briefly on certain events of international importance.
It has been said that we would invite such and such persons and that we would not invite others. At the moment and in accord with custom it is the Frei government that handles official invitations. We will handle ours through the Central Workers’ Union, the Youth Command of People’s Unity and the universities.
I also have the right to invite certain personalities and I say that we will invite whomever we consider it convenient to invite without submitting to any authority other than our own the right to invite whomever we please.
I have already pointed out that your victory, the people’s victory, has brought forth an incalculable degree of solidarity. Thousands and thousands of cables have come from all parts of the world, letters and communications from all progressive, revolutionary and authentically democratic forces. I can tell you that I have already been invited by the socialists of Sweden and of Norway, for example, that I have been invited by the Italian socialists, that I have been invited by peoples’ movements in Latin America.
I want to single out as an example the letter received — and it is a shame there isn’t time for me to read it — from the former President of Mexico, whose name is engraved in the consciousness of the men of Latin America. I refer to the man who nationalized oil and began the march toward agrarian reform for the commoners, the general and the man always present in the people’s struggle, Lazaro Cardenas.
Official information emanating from the organizations responsible permits me to tell you that from July to September 5300 North American citizens have entered the country.
Welcome tourists, welcome journalists, intellectuals, artists, North American citizens who are authentically North Americans, and are therefore representatives of the people who understand our right, which is irrenounceable.
And unwelcome! Because among these 5300 a not insignificant percentage of CIA agents must have infiltrated. Let them understand that we are vigilant and that if Chile’s frontiers are open in a fraternal fashion to those clean and responsible citizens of any country, the fist of Chile, of its people, of People’s Unity, will fall implacably on those who try to alter our lives by the criminal methods of international traffic.
Thirty Cuban gusanos have arrived. We know their names and we're just about able to say that we know where they are hiding. From that point on, we advise the investigation authority — and I personally advised the director of investigations yesterday — that we will take no individual action. Until November 3, this government is responsible. Let it fulfill its duty. But let it know that we are alert, and those who have been traitors to their country, their revolution and their blood are not going to come here to sow counterrevolution. If they were thrown out or left their country, they will also leave here punished.
I am hurt and concerned, because I have respect for the dignity of the position, that the President of the Congress of Chile, Senator Tomas Pablo [exclamations from the people] — silence, comrades — has said that 40 or more Hungarians have entered Chile, that they came to train the guerrillas. I believe Senator Tomas Pablo is a little behind the times.
What happened is that, for the first time in 1969, the famous great spectacular of Budapest came — the Hungarian state circus.
That is what Senator Tomas Pablo must be referring to.
As for the other Hungarians, it is regrettable that he told the country his information was authentic because it had been given to him by a Minister of State.
Well, regrettably for the President of the Congress of Chile, head of one of the state powers, his statements have been demolished by the Hungarian representative in Chile, and also by a letter published in all the daily newspapers by the Hungarian Chargé d’Affaires in Chile and even by the Chilean Ministry of Foreign Affairs itself.
The Chargé d’Affaires or the Hungarian Ambassador in Chile told the President of the Chilean Senate that actually guerrillas had entered but that they are engaged in an educational guerrilla activity, that they are university professors, and that they have been in Chile for several years.
It is regrettable that the head of a public office has to receive such a hard lesson from a representative of another country and from Chile's own representative in Hungary. And it is to be hoped that Mr. Tomas Pablo will never again forget this lesson.
A daily newspaper whose name I will not mention and which you know and know why I do not name it, has launched a steady attack against People's Unity in a series of editorials. But there is one editorial in this paper which in my judgment has an extraordinary intent and a deceitful point of view. Not only does it touch on aspects of national life but also projects its sinister imagination onto the international scene. And it maintains that Chile is going to be isolated, that we will not be able to trade with Latin-American countries, that we are going to be outside the international organizations.
Very well. This is what that editorial said when the press stated among other things that I had conversed for long hours with Felipe Herrera, president of the BID (Inter-American Developmental Bank). And if I conversed with him it is because I am interested in knowing what credits Chile has or can obtain.
That I had conversed with the ex-President of Colombia, Carlos Lleras Restrepo, with whom we analyzed the perspectives of the Andes Pact.
These journalists know that Pedro Zusjoric, under my direct charge, had conversed with the Argentine commercial representative to explain our problem concerning the desire to increase commercial interchange with Argentina, which I believe already comes to $200 000 000 a year.
Very well, they knew all this. And nevertheless they write an editorial stating that our proposal is to isolate Chile.
Here before all the people gathered in the Caupolican Theater, and to those who are listening over the whole network, I tell you: we are going to have diplomatic and commercial relations with all the countries of the world, only by defending Chile’s interests and recognizing that commerce is bilateral and that there are reciprocal interests in buying and selling.
We will not give up any market, nor any trade. Not in Europe, nor the United States. But we have the right to effectively seek out new markets, and we will do so without asking anyone's permission, looking out for Chile’s interests only. And we are going to stay in the OAS (Organization of American States) in order to expound our position within this somewhat unprestigious organization. We will go to the United Nations taking the ideas, the proposals and the creative sentiment of the people’s government of Chile, and we will stimulate the LAFTA (Latin-American Free Trade Association) because this course is correct for the country, and we will stimulate the Andes Pact more and more in order to have more trade with Ecuador, with Peru, with Bolivia and with Colombia, and hopefully Venezuela will join the Andes Pact.
It is true that we will have our criteria there, in the sense that this trade benefits the people and not the imperialist monopolies and national oligarchies.
And this is what we will do in the international field. But briefly — and I hope you hear me in silence because it is not a matter of making an agitational speech — I want to explain to the socialists and to Chile in brief form (and I am pleased that it is 2 pm, which proves to me that the people’s spiritual hunger is greater than their material hunger), I am going to explain some essential ideas that we are going to carry out which must interest everyone here and all those listening.
In the economic field, we must start the People’s Unity program going. We do not hide the magnitude of the task that we have proposed. We will receive an economy of the sharpened contradictions of a regime which at the very least has been incapable of resolving the people’s essential problems.
The unemployment figures were already very high before September 4 and new problems of unemployment have been added in the last weeks. In addition to the low level of economic growth, the activities of important sectors have fallen still further. Inflationary pressures have been accentuated, resulting in a 33% increase in the cost of living in the current year. The fiscal situation has deteriorated. Because I can point out that according to the technical office of the United Nations, Chile is surpassed only by South Viet Nam in the inflationary process. The people know very well what is behind the maneuvers that have taken place in the last few weeks. You know that the big foreign monopolistic and national interests have moved with double finality to create a chaotic economic situation and to search for a way to ignore the people's will. Or at the least to create conditions that interfere as much as possible with our action after the 4th of November.
The workers know or should know very well that we have a job to do now in the face of these unpatriotic maneuvers. It is necessary to watch and to denounce anyone who fails to replace raw materials that have been stored, or who takes out and does not replace stocks of spare parts, is careless in maintaining machinery. It is necessary to watch and to denounce any maneuver directed against the criminal debilitation of the productive capacity.
I was in Concepcion. The comrades in the Bellavista cloth industry recited their tragedy to me and I said publicly that if we could not personally resolve it, because we were not the government, we could raise our voice and our effort to solve this problem which had dragged on for three months or more. And when the Ready-To-Wear Association came to talk to me, they explained that no one had been dismissed but that they lacked raw materials from Bellavista. I knew that the owner of this industry had gone to Buenos Aires. It seems that he received a message, returned, and because of the intervention of our people in the Ministry of Work, the problem was solved and the aforementioned empresario, in a trembling hand, signed what he had not wished to sign if three months. Not by imposition but because it was correct that he sign it. And so the workers of Bellavista are working again and those who are a part of the Ready-To-Wear Association are going to receive their raw materials.
Similarly I sent a letter to the Chuquicamata workers. The petition requests were not taken care of and a strike was called. I sent a communication to these workers to tell them to realize that, respecting their rights and without renouncing them, this strike must be resolved quickly, and let no worker think that we won't explain to him the meaning of the disproportionate rise that brings as its consequence — as in copper — a chain reaction not only in the copper market enterprise, but also in the inflationary national process.
When the moment for the readjustment of pay and salaries arrives, comrades, I will speak to the people, I will explain what scale we are going to use, and I know perfectly well that the people will support it. In our judgment, the Chuquicamata strike must start on the path to solution because we will not wish to receive a more damaged national economy, because the very enterprise that knows we are going to nationalize it will be able to behave generously at the last minute, at our expense; and while respecting the rights of the Chuquicamata workers, we are not going to create a workers’ aristocracy in any work sector.
I am certain that the copper workers will understand this language. And they will understand that the government of the people is their government, and so they and the rest of the workers are not going to allow themselves to be pushed into strikes, and without renouncing their rights nor the irrevocable right to strike, they will find just and speedy solutions in order to defend, now above all, the national economy.
Therefore, I want the comrades who are listening to me to understand that the present difficulties cannot obscure our principal objectives. Our gigantic task is to master the conditions which the present system has been incapable of resolving.
Greater economic expansion and, at the same time, control of inflationary pressures. Rapid increase in productivity and at the same time greater use of the workforce. Greater speed in technological advancement and at the same time less dependency on sources from which the techniques come. Greater dovetailing of the Chilean economy with that of other Latin-American countries, as I already said, and at the same time full ability to differentiate our objectives for internal transformation. To that end we must undertake from the first day of government the basic changes outlined in the People’s Unity program. The character of these changes will be reflected in two fundamental aspects: in the relationship of domination and control of the Chilean economy. Listen carefully: the essential point is the substitution of foreign domination and certain large monopolistic interests by social domination of an extent and type compatible with the continuation and development of private productive activities.
The categorical reply to what I am suggesting is contained in the program of the People’s Unity in the three areas that this program covers. The area of social ownership: its conduct of the economy. In this there is no revenge nor zeal to expropriate simply to expropriate. Listen carefully, neither revenge nor zealous expropriation for expropriation's sake, in which we appear as pseudorevolutionaries. But by the same token we say that expropriation is necessary in order to develop the Chilean economy, that we are going to do it implacably without any type of bargaining.
In order to insure the operations and strengthen the social area of this economy, Chile’s control of its basic wealth is indispensable: its copper, iron, steel. Public control of all financial mechanisms such as banks — let it be known — social ownerships of basic activities, strategic to the process of development, capable of generating a volume of surpluses whose channeling cannot be allowed to be surrendered to monopoly capital. Example: the iron and steel industry — that is to say, steel and its derivatives.
In the area of mixed industry there will have to be an integration by means of activities in which there is an interest in reconciling — let them note this — the means of assuring a social function, along with the private enterprises. For example, automobile assembly, certain lines of production of capital goods: agricultural machinery, for instance. Not only will state decisions contribute to the set up in these areas but we will also accept and seek the initiative of those private sectors that have a spirit of nationalism and understand what we wish to do and the means by which we are going to succeed.
The private sector: in this area there are 30000 or more small- and medium-sized industries or enterprises and crafts that we are going to aid.
Their perspectives are not those of subsistence but rather operation under better conditions than now exist, with more precise and stable regulations within the framework of a plan of national economic development which is not subject to the whims of the big monopolies, on whom they now depend for raw material supplies, distribution of their products, etc.
With easier credit terms, less bureaucratic control and the important simplification of the system imposed. What is important in defining the extension of each area is a fundamental criteria: that the basic decisions concerning the future of the national economy do not depend on interests that are tied up with foreign capital and certain national monopolistic groups, but rather on the legitimate interests of Chile and her people. For this reason, we have said that the program of People’s Unity breaks Chile’s economic dependency, breaks Chile’s political dependency, and breaks Chile’s cultural dependency. We want to be a free country economically and sovereign master of its social and political destiny, comrades.
Consequently, all these measures will be taken to reorient the productive force toward the necessities of the great masses of the population. The distribution of profits will be different so that the extremes of wealth and poverty will be eradicated, As I have told you, we cannot tolerate the fact that, as far as pensions are concerned, for example, 80% of the workers receive 247 escudos a month while there are rich men who receive 20 or 25 million pesos' in monthly pensions. This is going to be ended — definitively, comrades.
We must raise the levels of popular consumption, control squandering and waste in the form of lavish consumer goods. The structure of the productive capacity will have to be adjusted to this change in distribution of revenues, The task of reorientation is enormous in taxes, in the traditional attitude of enterprise. In the new method that has to be developed, in the reconversion of what now exists there is a true challenge for the technicians and the industrialists themselves. Essential consumer products must be guaranteed. Large segments of the population must be raised to higher levels of consumption and forms of human existence. We cannot tolerate the moral and physiological misery in which millions of Chileans live. Our battle is against hunger, against unemployment, against the lack of housing and education. And we are going to conquer as we have conquered and will conquer and overthrow exploitation and misery.
For the first time in history we will be able to evaluate for purposes of our own interests, the natural resources in which we are extraordinarily rich. Our task is to be capable of projecting ourselves onto the world market as great and efficient producers of copper goods and not only as important exporters of raw copper. The same is true of our forest reserves and other activities.
In sum, a reorientation that raises us to the level of efficient producers of popular consumer goods. To sustain this production with our own capacity for making possible new equipment and the necessary basic investments. For specialization in several central industrial lines on a high technological level which will allow us to enter the world market without complexes.
This is our task in the economic field for these first years. And as time is short I want to reiterate and affirm only that this is the initial stage we must reach, after which will indisputably come the six-year plans that we are going to fulfill year after year and in which the people will participate not only by understanding but also by discussion.
And here too, socialist comrades, women and men, I want you to understand definitely that everything must be viewed with a new mentality. Yesterday we were the fighting opposition against the regime and the system.
From the 4th on, we will be the government and, comrades, then we are going to have to measure not only our responsibility but pour out our creative capacity as well. And while singing our revolutionary hymn which we hold so close to our socialist hearts, I say to you: perhaps we must sing these verses for the last time. Do not forget that there is a stanza which says: “against the present shame.” After November 4 we're not going to be able to say that, comrades [laughter from the people]. I say that because I am sure that we are capable of fulfilling our goals.
And this is the task, among others, of the Party: to be ever vigilant, pushing, pushing, and pushing ahead, comrades, toward the achievement of the true liberation of Chile and of its heritage.
You already have a vision then, however small. of the aspects we wish to confront. of the national and international projections of the people’s government.
I have already said here. and it must be emphasized, that this is the first time in the history of the world that a people has won the government by electoral means in order to take power from the government and use the power to make revolutionary changes which permit the creation of a new society, a new morality. a new life and a new concept of man and of the human couple.
We are undertaking an extraordinary task and one made more difficult by the vacillations of the government of Mr. Frei since the 4th of September, with an insolent, provocative, conspiratorial attitude or the part of reactionary sectors in Chile that have wished to waste the national economy and destroy without concern for the harm it does to Chile, goods that belong to everyone, and endangering the lives of innocent human beings.
How well the people have already learned what it means to talk of democracy and not practice it! How well the people have already learned the lesson that those who talk about respecting all victories meet the victory of the people by trying to close the roads and even reach the point of using foreign mercenaries to prevent our triumph!
But comrades, finally and now I say to you socialists gathered in this theater and to those who are listening to me throughout the country that, with the profound satisfaction of being a founding member of the Party and with the awareness that I am also a founder of People's Unity, I will come to the government knowing that the people will always stimulate me to move forward, that the people, with legitimate right, will demand explanations if by chance I should hesitate.
But that the people must know, and on this I stake my word as a social fighter, that never will they see me retreat, and I cannot retreat because you are the barricades that say Chile has the right to advance and advance until it is possible for the man and the woman of our nation to have a new life, to make a different kind of nation a possibility, with its own characteristics, so that Chile is a family from Arica to Magallanes and from the mountains to the sea, because we are a people united in the great national task of making possible the material and spiritual progress of Chileans.
Comrades, we won yesterday, we will win today and we will win tomorrow because we remain united and because, comrades, we are the people.