, hand over the commander-in-chief baton to his successor Ricrado Izurieta at his scheduled retirement ceremony in Santiago's flag-festoooned Military School. Pinochet swept to power in September 1973 after ousting socialist president Salvador Allende in a bloody coup. He dissolved congress, banned political parties and set out on a witchhunt of known left wingers in Chile. The general remained in power for 17 years, only stepping down when he did not gain 50 percent support in a 1988 plebiscite. At least 3,000 people died or vanished under his regime. Chile returned to civilian rule in 1990 but Pinochet stayed on as head of the army. His grandiose retirement ceremony marks the official end to a military career spanning 65 years. But he does not plan to step down from the public limelight. Pinochet is now free to take up a life-long, unelected seat in the country's senate -- a privilege for past presidents serving at least six years in office that he wrote into the Constitution in 1980.