The National Libertarian Party (PNL) is demanding that President José Antonio Kast announce pardons for military personnel and police officers convicted over events during the 2019 social unrest. According to El Mostrador, the parliamentary caucus wants this to happen on the upcoming October 18, Kast's first in La Moneda.
"I think it would be an important signal for this to happen on this date," said Deputy Hans Marowski, the PNL's vice president and caucus leader. He added that the President "has an outstanding commitment" and that they have been waiting for him to fulfill it since March.
The PNL, the party led by Johannes Kaiser, is not part of the governing coalition. However, it maintains direct talks with Kast and insistently presses him from the right to fulfill his commitments.
Deputy caucus leader Paulina Muñoz went further. "If the President does not want to make that decision, let him leave it to us in Congress through the general pardon bill," she said. She added that her caucus would not hesitate to "pardon our heroes."
The promise has a specific origin. In March 2025, as a candidate, Kast said he would pardon police officers convicted over events linked to the unrest. Almost seven months after he took office, that has not happened.
Pressure is also coming from the governing coalition. In August, 60 deputies from different caucuses signed a letter asking Kast to consider the pardons. They included Sergio Bobadilla (UDI), Francisco Orrego (RN), Enrique Bassaletti and Valentina Becerra (Republicans). Senator Arturo Squella, president of the Republican Party, is sponsoring the PNL's general pardon bill.
The impatience is not new. In September, after meeting with Kast at Cerro Castillo, Kaiser said he saw no willingness from the executive branch to move forward.
La Moneda maintains its position. It reviews requests case by case and makes no commitment on deadlines. It has also not granted urgency to the general pardon bill, introduced in June and still at its first legislative stage in the Senate. As of Friday afternoon, the PNL had received no response from the Government.
On the opposing side, opposition deputies such as Gustavo Gatica, Lorena Fries and Emilia Schneider are pushing a constitutional amendment to eliminate individual pardons, the President's power to commute or reduce sentences individually. The bill, introduced in March, is also at its first legislative stage.
The proposal recalls that right-wing lawmakers, such as Felipe Kast, Iván Moreira, José García Ruminot and Luciano Cruz-Coke, promoted similar reforms during Gabriel Boric's government. "The problem with individual pardons is not who grants them, but that they exist," the text states.
Meanwhile, the Government is using the unrest to explain the country's situation. In September, before the United Nations (UN), Kast said that October 2019 fractured Chile and attributed effects on investment, employment and violence to it.
This week, during the debate on the 2027 Budget, Finance Minister Jorge Quiroz returned to that idea before Christian businesspeople. "We are all still scared by October 18," he said, and urged them to overcome their fear.
The executive branch talks about the unrest, but has not said whether it will announce pardons. The response, if it comes, has a date the PNL has already marked: Saturday, October 18, when seven years will have passed since the crisis.
