SANTIAGO – Politicians of the right-wing party UDI have responded furious on a video of deputy Gabriel Boric. In the video, Boric appears with a shirt of UDI-founder Jaime Guzmán with a bullet in his head. The video was published by former UDI-member José Antonio Kast, who warned in the accompanying tweet for the dangers of radical left in Chile.
The video dates back from 2017 and shows Boric (Movimiento Autonomista) receiving a t-shirt with the face of murdered UDI-founder Jaime Guzmán, with a bullet wound in his forehead. Boric receives the t-shirt with a smile, probably not knowing the controversy the interview would cause two years later.
José Antonio Kast, the far-rightwing senator and former member of UDI, published the footage on December 31 on Twitter, writing “A coffee with a murderer (Boric met with the alleged murderer of Jaime Guzmán, Ricardo Palma Salamanca, in France last year, red.), a shirt with the image of Jaime Guzmán with a bullet in his head. This is the radical left that wants to rule Chile.”
Un café con el asesino, una polera con la imagen de Jaime Guzmán con un balazo en la cabeza. Esa es la izquierda radical que quiere gobernar Chile. Tenemos que trabajar mucho para evitarlo pic.twitter.com/qmJz56ohom
— José Antonio Kast 🇨🇱 (@joseantoniokast) December 31, 2018
Gabriel Boric apologized in La Tercera for the controversy, saying that he was “suddenly given a totally inappropriate shirt carrying the image of Jaime Guzmán. My reaction when I received it was not right, as I was grateful where I should have rejected the gift”.
Meanwhile, a group of UDI parliamentarians announced that they will request the Ethics Commission of the Lower Chamber of the Chilean Congress to apply the “maximum penalty” for the appeared footage. This would mean, among other restrictions, a cut of 15% in the deputy´s salary. The UDI-members asked the Ethics Commission to make sure that Boric “at least once in his political career must assume a manly attitude and declare what he thinks of the killing of Jaime Guzman”.
Editor-In-Chief Boris van der Spek is the founder of Chile Today.