Jorge Ibáñez

Jorge Eduardo Ibáñez Vergara (17 December 1926 – 22 January 2012) was a Chilean historian, writer and politician.

He studied at the Basic School and the High School of his hometown, before entering the Internado Nacional Barros Arana. He later joined the University of Chile School of Law, where he began his political career as a member of the Radical Party.

He held public posts in the Ministry of the Interior. He was Head of the Department of Immigration, Head of the Administrative and Interior Government Department, and Director of Mail and Telegraph. He also served as advisor to several public and private companies.

In 1965 he was elected Deputy for the 14th Departmental Group of Linares, Loncomilla and Parral, being re-elected in 1969. In 1970 he was elected President of the Chamber of Deputies. In 1971 he resigned from the Radical Party to join the Radical Left Movement, which later became the Radical Left Party and in 1973 was renamed the Social Democracy Party.

After the coup d'état, which installed a military dictatorship, he joined the activities for the recovery of democracy. He collaborated in the formation of the Concertación coalition that led the "No" campaign in the 1988 Chilean national plebiscite.

In the 1993 parliamentary elections, he ran as a candidate for Deputy for District 40 (Longaví, Parral, Retiro, Cauquenes, Pelluhue, and Chanco), but was not elected. The following year he joined the Party for Democracy.

A member of the Grand Lodge of Chile,^[1] he was also a writer of short stories and texts on Chilean history in the 19th century. He was a member of the Society of Writers of Chile.

In 2008, the Supreme Court of Chile appointed him as a member of the Electoral Qualification Court of Chile (Tricel), in his capacity as former President of the Chamber of Deputies, a position he held until his death in January 2012.^[1]

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