The Honourable María Isabel Allende |
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President of the Chilean Senate | |
In office 11 March 2014 – 11 March 2015 |
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Deputy | |
Preceded by | Jorge Pizarro |
Succeeded by | |
Senator for Atacama | |
Assumed office 11 March 2010 |
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Preceded by | |
Leader of the Socialist Party of Chile | |
Assumed office 17 May 2015 |
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Preceded by | Osvaldo Andrade |
President of the Chilean Chamber of Deputies | |
In office 18 March 2003 – 16 March 2004 |
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Preceded by | |
Succeeded by | |
Member of the Chilean Chamber of Deputies | |
In office 11 March 1994 – 11 March 2010 |
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Personal details | |
Born |
Santiago, Chile |
18 January 1945
Nationality | Chilean |
Political party | Socialist Party of Chile |
Children | Gonzal Marcia |
Alma mater | University of Chile |
Profession | Sociologist |
Website | Official website |
Isabel Allende Bussi (born January 18, 1945 in Santiago de Chile) is a Chilean Socialist Party politician and the daughter of former president of Chile Salvador Allende, and his wife, Hortensia Bussi. From 1994 to 2010 she was a deputy and in March 2010 she became a senator for the Atacama Region. On 28 February 2014, Allende was selected as president of the Senate, as of 11 March 2014, making her the first woman president of the body in Chilean history.
She went to the Maisonette College, and unlike her sisters, was initially attracted to the Catholic Church and received her first communion. In 1962, at the age of 17 she began studying sociology, and joined the university's socialist brigade. Five years later she accompanied her father to the congress of the Socialist Party in Chile.
Her first marriage with Sergio Meza, son of Gonzalo Meza Allende, did not last long, but they had a son Gonzal. With her second husband, Romilio Tambutti, she had a daughter named Marcia.
On 11 September 1973, the day of the military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet, Isabel was the last person to enter the presidential palace. Ater the military began to bomb the presidential palace, and the outcome was already clear, her father ordered the women to leave.
Isabel obtained political asylum in Mexico, with her mother and sister, where she spent sixteen years in exile, before returning to Chile in 1989, in the final stretch of the military regime.
On returning to her homeland, Isabel began a successful political career; after Chile's return to democracy in 1990, she was elected as an MP, presiding over the house between 2003 and 2004, becoming the second woman to head this legislative body, after Adriana Muñoz.