Orel Viciani
Orel Viciani | |
|---|---|
| Member of the Chamber of Deputies of Chile | |
| In office 15 May 1973 – 11 September 1973 | |
| Succeeded by | 1973 coup d'etat |
| Constituency | 1st Provincial Group |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 11 September 1943 |
| Party | Communist Party (PC) Socialist Party (PS) |
| Spouse | Cecilia Ostornol[1] |
| Children | One[1] |
| Education | Instituto Nacional General José Miguel Carrera |
| Occupation | Politician |
Orel Viciani Escker (born 11 September 1943) is a Chilean politician.[2]
After the 1973 coup d'etat, Viciani went into exile in Cuba. There, he became one of the Chilean communist leaders who oversaw the preparation of the guerrilla group known as the Frente Patriótico Manuel Rodríguez (FPMR), which sought to lead an armed insurgency against the Chilean military regime.
To this end, hundreds of young Chilean exiles in Cuba and other socialist bloc countries were recruited. He also wrote various articles in Marxist-oriented opposition publications.
Biography
He was born in the city of Iquique, the son of José Segundo Viciani Araya and Clotilde Escker. In 1970, he married Cecilia Ostornol, with whom he had one son, Pablo.
He completed his secondary education at the Iquique High School and the José Victorino Lastarria High School in Santiago. He studied pedagogy in Biology at the University of Chile, serving as president of the student association for that program between 1969 and 1970. During that period, he joined the Communist Party of Chile.
Political career
In 1973, he was elected deputy for the First Departmental Grouping of Arica, Iquique, and Pisagua. In that capacity, he sat on the Standing Committees on Foreign Affairs and Latin American Integration. However, the military coup of September 11, 1973, brought his term to an early end. Decree-Law 27, dated September 21 of that year, dissolved the National Congress and declared all parliamentary functions terminated as of that date.
Upon returning to the country in 1989, Viciani joined the Partido Amplio de Izquierda Socialista, an instrumental leftist coalition. He was a candidate for deputy in the 1989 parliamentary elections for District 1, composed of the communes of Arica, Camarones, General Lagos, and Putre. However, he obtained only 8.34% of the vote and was not elected, despite having previously represented that area.
Subsequently, Viciani switched his membership to the Socialist Party of Chile (PS). In 1992, he ran for city council (concejal) in the commune of Estación Central during that year's municipal elections but was defeated.
In the 2000s, he held positions in the governments of the Concertación coalition. Between 2002 and 2003, he served as Regional Ministerial Secretary of Government for the O’Higgins Region, and between 2006 and 2008, he was a member of the International Relations Unit of the Undersecretariat for Regional and Administrative Development (SUBDERE).
He currently resides in Santiago.
References
- ^ a b "Orel Viciani Escker – Reseñas biográficas parlamentarias". Library of the National Congress of Chile. Retrieved 4 September 2025.
- ^ Orel Viciani me cae bien. Books Open Edition. ISBN 978-2-8218-9577-5. Retrieved 4 September 2025.