Michel Bachelet and her Leadership

At 11:00 o’clock in the morning, The President Mrs. Michel Bachelet arrives in Castro’s Airdrome. Many people have been waiting many hours for her. She greets everyone with her well-known charm and good humour. Far away, a bunch of people demonstrates for the construction of Chiloé Bridge. She approaches them and tries to talk to them about the reasons why she did not want to build the brigde yet. The president has had to live these kinds of situations for 3 years, facing many problems from the Penguin’s revolution to Chaitén Volcano. All the people agree with the fact that whatever president has to face this problems with wisdom and leadership. But it is particularly interesting when we are in front of the first female president of Chile.

Chile has been a country governed by male presidents since its birth. Our people used to see governors hitting a table, pointing with the finger with no fear, offering diplomatic relationship right here right now. But, these last three years, we are seeing a different way to face the problems. Nevertheless, an important sector of the people feels that Mrs Bachelet has a lack of leadership. For example, she has been criticized due to her performance during the Penguin Revolution, and the way to resolve the problem calling to a commission to discuss about education. Perhaps, they expected a performance similar to Ricardo Lagos’, Augusto Pinochet’, or Eduardo Frei’, but what they forget is that She is a woman. She cannot take a male attitude, because it does not fit to her. This kind of situations has repeated with the Transantiago crisis, the current economic international crisis, etc. Obviously, nobody is perfect. All the presidents make mistakes during the government, but I feel that most of the criticism against Bachelet is not only for her decisions about problems but simply because she is a woman. Only the time will judge her management. In that moment, we will be able to analyze her performance in retrospective.

Certainly, after many time fighting for her rights, the time to the women’s power has arrived to keep in the time. Surely, the women have a long way to cross. They still have to face the machismo in our society, and they have to show us that they are able to assume the responsibility to address a country or occupy important positions with firmness but under a woman outlook.