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'State doesn't fulfil its functions!' - Chile's Kast slams govt inefficiency, unveils anti-cronyism plan ahead of presidential race

'State doesn't fulfil its functions!' - Chile's Kast slams govt inefficiency, unveils anti-cronyism plan ahead of presidential race

"Chilean right-wing presidential candidate Jose Antonio Kast presented on Monday a plan to reform public employment and combat cronyism within the government. During a press conference in Santiago, he stated that citizen services are inefficient and criticised the increase in public employees in recent years. "Today, the State does not properly fulfil the function that citizens, the residents of each municipality, are expecting. And they see how the number of people working in the State increases, how plans and programs expand, but that does not always match the quality of the service these people receive," he said. Kast, who trails Communist candidate Jeannette Jara in recent polls, said that if elected president, he would cut the number of public employees to reduce what he described as an inflated state workforce of more than one million. "From 2014 to date, it has only gone up, and we now have about 1,200,000 people who depend in one way or another on some form of State remuneration," he stated. He told the press that he plans to identify employees "in positions they shouldn’t occupy" by establishing a "unified registry of public servants." Kast, 59, is the Republican Party's presidential candidate and is running for a second time after losing the previous election to Gabriel Boric. The first round of the presidential elections will be held on November 16, and if no candidate surpasses 50 per cent of the votes, the two candidates with the highest vote counts will face each other in a runoff on December 14."

'Let Gaza be rebuilt' - Maduro calls for Palestinian State recognition, urges reconstruction of enclave

'Let Gaza be rebuilt' - Maduro calls for Palestinian State recognition, urges reconstruction of enclave

"Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro celebrated the ceasefire reached between Hamas and Israel in recent days during the broadcast of his programme 'Con Maduro +' in Caracas on Monday. He also called for the State of Palestine to be recognised by the UN and for its people to be able to elect their own government democratically. "Let Gaza be rebuilt, let all of the West Bank be guaranteed for Palestine, let East Jerusalem be guaranteed as the capital, and let the United Nations recognise the Palestinian State, the Palestinian Authority, and a government elected by the Palestinians themselves," Maduro stated. He also highlighted the importance of public opinion, particularly in the United States, which he said influenced US President Donald Trump to help mediate the halt of Israeli military operations in Gaza. "Sixty per cent of those surveyed in the United States support the Palestinian cause and described what was happening in Palestine, in Gaza, as genocide," Maduro noted. Maduro also stressed that most Venezuelans oppose any form of intervention by the United States in their country. "More than 90 per cent of the country say that what the US government seeks is our oil, our wealth, and that if Venezuela did not have that oil wealth, they would not even talk about Venezuela," he said. Finally, Maduro affirmed that the people of Venezuela are hard-working and rejected being labelled as criminals, as President Trump has described Venezuelan migrants in the United States. "Venezuelans are not criminals or members of any gang. Venezuelans are people of work, culture, joy, prosperity, families of kindness, and communities of kindness - we are a beautiful people," Maduro concluded. "