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Christian Little's Resignation Fails to End Strike and Highlights Crisis at CONAF

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• President Boric appointed Aída Baldini as executive director, a career official and forestry and wildfires manager during Sebastián Piñera's governments.

"That was the first point (...). We have also been saying that the Minister of Agriculture (Esteban Valenzuela) should step aside. He lacks the competence for the role and is just another political operator who has brought in his own people, members of his party, into various divisions of the ministry, including CONAF (National Forestry Corporation)," stated Ricardo Heinsohn, president of the Professionals' Union (Sinaprof), a group that welcomed the resignation of Christian Little, now former executive director of the entity.

"The obstacle to reaching agreements, to talking, to dialoguing, to working together, is gone," added the leader, who claimed that the management of the resigned authority, which lasted two years, was "regrettable (...). They came only to destroy CONAF, both internally and externally."

Among other accusations, the professionals' union pointed out that Little had brought into the corporation a series of individuals linked to the Frente Amplio in highly paid positions without the necessary skills to handle, for example, the wildfire season.

The forestry engineer had to testify before the Investigative Commission of the Chamber of Deputies regarding his performance in addressing the deadly wildfires last summer in the Valparaíso Region.

Despite Little's departure, the strike continues: "We resolved to continue the strike, without prejudice to talking with the new authority once they assume office and call us," said Heinsohn.

The unionists assured that other demands in their petition remain pending, such as "ending and removing individuals who have been handpicked without any competitive process and with high salaries, many of whom lack the competence or experience to perform their assigned roles, to the detriment of experienced officials." Alongside this, they expressed openness to dialogue once the new authority takes office, which will occur in a complex internal scenario marked by successive strikes—first by park rangers and now by professionals.

The new director is Aída Baldini, a forestry engineer from the Universidad Austral de Chile and a career official at CONAF, where she served as forestry and wildfires manager during Sebastián Piñera's first and second governments, respectively.

She was appointed by President Gabriel Boric but will assume the role upon her return to the country from the United States, where she was on vacation.

Little's resignation was also welcomed by Deputy Tomás Lagomarsino (PR), who chaired the investigative commission on the Viña del Mar mega-fire.

"After the damning report (...) it was the least we could expect, given the multiple findings across various institutions in the emergency and disaster response system that constituted errors, but particularly those of CONAF represented grave and inexcusable negligence, even potentially criminal," he emphasized.

Besides pointing out planning, reaction, and decision-making errors during the emergency—such as diverting CONAF's observation and coordination aircraft from the Lo Moscoso fire, leaving emergency institutions blind—Lagomarsino highlighted what he considers a critical mistake: "One hour and six minutes before the SAE alerts we know about, CONAF already knew the fire was heading toward Viña del Mar with rapid advance," stated the deputy.

Source: subscription edition ofEl Mercurio