For the first time since the fascist military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, tanks rolled into downtown Santiago, Chile, this weekend, deployed against protesters demonstrating against a drastic fare hike of the Santiago metro, from the equivalent of USD $1.12 to $1.16.

On Saturday, the right-wing government of billionaire Sebastián Piñera invoked the still-standing 1980 Constitution established by Pinochet to declare a state of emergency across the country and to impose curfews.

This is off the back of a massive strike wave earlier in the year where 17,000 walmart workers, 80,000 school teachers and other workers across mining and railways took strike action amidst massive state repression.

This week's show features Marisol Salinas, a Mapuche Indigenous woman from Chile, based here in Melbourne, and one of the founders of the Latin American Solidarity Network, and also with Friends of the Earth Melbourne.