Angela Rifo has experienced unspeakable violence. During Chile’s seventeen-year dictatorship, the trade unionist was detained and tortured. Since then, she has dedicated her life to ensuring that others wouldn’t have to suffer as she did — including in the workplace.
This history explains why Rifo, in her sixties, ended up in the same room as Jeannette Jara — then Chile’s minister of labor and social welfare — in spring 2022. As a labor leader for Chile’s National Association of Public Employees (ANEF), a union that represents 700,000 public sector workers, Rifo spent decades pushing to enact protections aimed at reducing violence in the workplace. That fight came to a head after 2019, when a nurse, Karin Salgado, committed suicide due to poor working conditions and harassment. Rifo began to work on a law that would bring Chile up to date with international labor regulations, equip employees with mechanisms to combat workplace violence, and address harassment. It was an important fight — and in Jara, Rifo found an unwavering ally.
For several years, the women worked hand in hand. On August 1, 2024, the law passed, two years after it was formally proposed. “Her work was fundamental,” Rifo says. “One of Jeannette’s qualities is her ability to communicate and coordinate not only with workers, but also with employers.”
Like many, Rifo believes that if Jara has a shot at becoming Chile’s next president after Sunday’s elections, despite the incumbent left-wing government’s low approval ratings, it’s because of her skills as a negotiator — and as someone who gets things done.
Her best hope: appeal to working-class voters and center-left reformers in a country with one of the highest rates of economic inequality in Latin America.
She’s going to need every tool in her kit. Jara, fifty-two, is running as the left-wing coalition’s joint candidate in the November 16 contest. A member of the country’s Communist Party (PCCh), Jara has…
Auteur: Phineas Rueckert
