CHILE: Meet the People

Anybody could come and tell his troubles to the President. Every Wednesday morning Gabriel González Videla cleared his desk, shooed away Cabinet Ministers, and for three hours held “Audiencias Populares.” The sessions became so popular with Chile’s Juan Pueblo that the waiting list soon reached 5,000.

Last week Gonzá1ez received some 200 man-in-the-street callers in his huge, gilt-&-damask office. A taxi driver under 60 days’ sentence for drunkenness explained that he was not driving while drunk—just sitting in his taxi on the edge of town, knowing that he had had one too many. The President suspended sentence.

A young girl said her paperhanger husband had a hard time finding a job because of paper-mill shutdowns. Gonzá1ez told his secretary to find the man a job.

So many of last week’s callers were women complaining that their husbands had run away from home and children that Gonzá1ez said, within earshot of reporters, that he meant to ask for stronger laws against men who abandoned their families.

As usual, the press played up the human drama. The real purpose of the sessions was undoubtedly sincere, but politically wise President Gonzá1ez knew that the publicity would do his regime no harm.