Police Clash with Chilean Students Who Defied National Mourning

Over 120,000 Chilean defied a state-declared day of mourning and took to the streets to demand the government to speed up their promised education reforms, including making university free, various news outlets reported.

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The day of mourning was declared to mark former President Patricio Aylwin's electoral victory marking the country's return to democracy in 1990. Aylwin was the first elected president after Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship era.

An estimated 120,000 students showed up in the streets to demand progress on the project of free university education, which was promised last year by President Michelle Bachelet.

Along the way, police shot water cannons and tear gas against against college and high school students, education workers and other employees and supporters called by the Confederation of University Students of Chile, or Confech.

Under pressure from massive student protests that erupted in 2011, Bachelet signed free university education last year. The protesters insisted, however, that the reforms are too slow, with less than 14 percent of students so far benefiting from free tuition, according to a Confech study.

Nothing stopped the students, who called for another march May 5. | Photo: EFE

They also protested the privatization of schools and high level of student debt — about 40.6 percent of students.

“Student debt is a symptom of the education market,” said Daniel Gedda, president of one of the student unions.

"Education can not wait,” said another student union president, Marta Matamala. “We understand that there is a national mourning, but there is no legal impediment to us doing it (protesting). It is a right associated with the end of the dictatorship."

The students did not receive a response to their petition of demands and are organizing a more radical march on May 5, according to teleSUR correspondent Beatriz Michell.

"It seems that the Ministry of Education only understands in strikes and marches," said Jose Corona, spokesperson of the National Coordinator of Secondary Students, which convened the march.

Their demands will include the delivery of student benefits, resource and infrastructure improvements and more funding for public schools.