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A man holds a sign representing Chilean President Sebastian Pinera and the late dictator Augusto Pinochet during a demonstration against the Chilean government in Santiago, Chile, on November 15, 2019. REUTERS / Jorge Silva

The Chilean president has supported the agreement passed by parliamentarians, which plans to hold a referendum - for or against a new constitution - that would replace the one adopted in 1980 in a dictatorship. But this agreement creates tensions both within the ruling right and the opposition.

With our correspondent in Santiago, Justine Fontaine

The most radical fringe of the ruling right-wing coalition had already struggled to sign an agreement Friday with most of the political parties represented in Congress. An agreement to hold a referendum in April to ask Chileans whether they want a new constitution or not.

So when three ministers of the government of Sebastian Pinera said publicly this weekend that they would vote "yes" to a new Constitution, the Independent Democratic Union (IDU) reacted quickly.

The president of this party founded by the right arm of General Pinochet, and father of the current Constitution, has publicly asked the government to remain neutral on this subject.

But it is probably the left-wing opposition that is the most divided regarding this deal: the communists refused to sign and two parties suspended their participation in the Frente Amplio (in French: Front Broad), a young coalition that had obtained more 16% of the votes in the legislative elections two years ago.

In short, the right as the left are under tension before the campaign for this referendum that could allow to erase for good the Constitution inherited from the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990).

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