Скачать или смотреть Bachelet declares victory and comments on expectation of runoff

(18 Nov 2013) Michelle Bachelet won nearly twice as many votes as her closest rival in Chile's presidential election on Sunday, but she fell short of the outright majority needed to avoid a December 15 runoff.
With more than 92 percent of votes counted, the moderate socialist Bachelet had nearly 47 percent, to 25 percent for conservative Evelyn Matthei.
Bachelet addressed cheering supporters in capital Santiago on Sunday evening.
She conceded lacking the votes for a first-round victory but predicted she would win big in the second round and push forward major reforms.
"The country has voted in the majority for the proposals we have made for Chile, so that Chile is once and for all for everyone. The modern, unified and fair country that we all want," she told her supporters.
She also said a second round offered the opportunity to show determination to "defeat inequalities, abuses and exclusions."
Matthei's campaign celebrated getting another try at Bachelet, this time in a one-on-one race.
"We are going to arrive with a message of moderation, with a broad message of building a country, and continuing to build a wonderful country and we are going to win in the second round," Matthei said.
The key will be whether Bachelet's centre-left New Majority coalition will gain the super-majorities in Congress needed to make those changes.
All 120 seats in the lower House of Congress and 20 of 38 Senate seats are at stake.
Under electoral rules imposed by General Augusto Pinochet to frustrate change, the losing party gets half the seats in each region if the winning party fails to secure more than two-thirds of the votes.
The dictatorship-era rules also require voting majorities in Congress of 57 percent for educational reform, 60 percent for electoral reform and nearly 67 percent for constitutional changes.


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