SANTIAGO (Reuters) – A Chilean judge yesterday charged figures from Gen. Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship with the murder of former President Eduardo Frei Montalva, which could boost support for Frei Montalva’s son in Sunday’s presidential vote.
There had long been suspicions in Chile that the country’s former military intelligence service poisoned Frei Montalva in 1982, though officials at the time said he had died from an infection after a hernia operation.
The judiciary said Judge Alejandro Madrid had ordered three people arrested and charged with the murder of Frei Montalva, who ruled Chile from 1964 to 1970. They were his driver, a junta doctor and an ex-member of Pinochet’s secret police.
The judge ordered three others to face trial, one as an accomplice to murder and two with covering up the alleged crime.
“This shows that justice takes time, but it does finally arrive as it has in this case,” President Michelle Bachelet, who was herself tortured during the dictatorship, told reporters. “This is good for our society.”
The ruling came as Frei Montalva’s son, Eduardo Frei, the ruling centre-left coalition’s presidential candidate, is vying for the presidency with conservative billionaire Sebastian Pinera, who is tipped to lead Sunday’s vote and beat Frei in a January run-off.
A Pinera win would break two decades of rule by the center-left coalition which came to power after Pinochet’s 1973-1990 dictatorship ended.
Eduardo Frei, who was president of Chile from 1994 to 2000, is running second in the polls ahead of a Dec. 13 first-round presidential vote. He has accused agents of Pinochet’s military government of killing his father.
While Pinera has long sought to distance himself from Pinochet’s rule, his power-base includes some of the former dictator’s supporters. Analysts say the murder probe could stir up memories of the right’s support for the regime.
“It helps Frei in that through memories and history … it shows that the right was linked to the dictatorship, and the Concertacion (ruling center-left coalition) was the opposition,” said Fabian Pressacco, a political analyst with the Universidad Alberto Hurtado in Santiago.
The order came as Frei and his rivals were campaigning, but was not seen swinging as the vote significantly.