[News] Life and death of José Mujica, the guerrilla fighter who became president

[Anti-Imperialist News]

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<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2025/05/15/life-and-death-of-jose-mujica-the-guerrilla-fighter-who-became-president/>
Life and death of José Mujica, the guerrilla fighter who became president
Pablo Meriguet
May 15, 2025
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[image: Pepe-Mujica-uruguay.jpg]

Former Uruguayan President José Pepe Mujica. Photo: Presidencia de Colombia
*Early life*

José “Pepe” Alberto Mujica Cordano was born in Montevideo on May 20, 1935.
His Uruguayan ancestry preceded the historical European migration to the
Rio de la Plata at the beginning of the 20th century. His paternal family
descended from Basques who arrived in Uruguay in the 19th century, while
his mother was a descendant of Italians from the north.

Mujica studied in public schools, but did not manage to finish high school
or go to university. Soon, his life was seduced by political militancy. At
an early age, he joined the National Party, a center-right Uruguayan party,
where he became Secretary of Youth, demonstrating political aptitude.
However, the more reactionary positions within the party, in addition to
the enormous effect produced by the Cuban Revolution of 1959, caused Mujica
to break away from the National Party in 1962 and found the Popular Union,
a socialist party.
*The armed struggle*

A few years later, the influence of the armed struggle waged by the left
across the continent pushed Mujica to join the National Liberation Movement
– Tupamaros. The group was an urban guerrilla movement that sought to
unleash a national revolution, and he took an active part in its
operations. Once the police registered him as a guerrilla, he went
underground and abandoned his work in the countryside.

The Pacheco Areco government stepped up repression against leftist groups,
and this intensified the work of the Tupamaros. In a skirmish with the
forces of law and order, Mujica was shot six times. After several guerrilla
operations, Pepe Mujica was arrested on four occasions, two of which
resulted in escapes that became famous not only in Uruguay but throughout
the continent for their preparation, ingenuity, and organization.
*A solitary confinement of 13 years*

Despite this, he was imprisoned again and spent 13 more years in prison
(between 1972 and 1985), where he had to endure the conditions that prisons
had in store for Latin American revolutionaries, such as torture and other
abuses. The National Government declared him as a “hostage” and threatened
the guerrilla movements that if they resumed their actions, their leaders
would be executed.

Years later, looking back on that period, in which he spent most of his
time in isolation, he said <https://www.bbc.com/mundo/articles/cvgmg23j7d5o>:
“Those years of solitude were probably the ones that taught me the most…I
had to rethink everything and learn to look inward at times, to avoid going
crazy… When I was a prisoner, I spent almost 7 years without books, in a
room smaller than this one. They moved me from barracks to barracks. Then I
ended up contracting the vice of misanthropy, of talking to myself. That
was like self-defense, in the conditions I was in, so that I wouldn’t lose
my mind. But it became ingrained in me. It became a habit.”
*Liberation and the Broad Front*

The return to democracy implied the liberation of several political
prisoners, among them Mujica, who returned to freedom in 1985. After
attempting a revolutionary struggle, José Mujica opted to take a path
framed within formal democracy, and under a new political movement called
the Movement of Popular Participation (MPP), he joined the Broad Front, a
broad alliance of left, center-left, and even center-right parties that
contested several elections. Mujica himself was elected deputy in 1994 and
was appointed in 1999 as President of the Senate, demonstrating a special
connection with the Uruguayan population, who saw him as a coherent
politician far removed from any kind of corruption.

In 2005, the Broad Front won the presidency of the republic under Tabaré
Vázquez, who decided that Mujica, who by then was one of the most important
leaders of the Broad Front, would be Secretary of Agriculture, Livestock,
and Fisheries. It was during this period that his ability to communicate in
a clear, simple, and at the same time, a profound way, gained importance in
Uruguayan politics. Mujica became an enormously charismatic character.
*The humble president of Uruguay*

These and other political qualities, such as showing himself as a unifying
and mediating subject in the Broad Front and between governments such as
the Uruguayan and the Argentine, paved his way as a presidential candidate.
After the first electoral round, Mujica defeated Luis Alberto Lacalle on
November 22, 2009, with about 52% of the valid votes. He was sworn in on
March 1, 2010, as President of the Oriental Republic of Uruguay in a public
square, together with his supporters, according to his wishes.

Soon, images of the life of Mujica and his wife, the important Uruguayan
politician Lucia Topolansky, spread around the world. They rejected the
luxuries offered by the presidential office. They continued to live in a
humble house in the countryside with their animals, while driving an aging
Volkswagen to get to their place of work, the office of the President of
the Republic. Many journalists and filmmakers became interested in his
story and his humility, so they started to conduct interviews and
documentaries about the so-called “poorest president in the world”.
Pepe Mujica at his home in Uruguay.

However, Mujica always refused to be called poor, because he considered
that poverty consisted of something different: “What is it that attracts
the world’s attention? That I live with little, in a simple house, that I
drive around in a little old car, are those the novelties? So, this world
is crazy because it is surprised by the normal. The poor are those who want
more, those who can’t afford anything. Those are poor because they get into
an endless race. And as I was president, they came here and saw this little
house, and they admired me. But they don’t emulate my life!”

His government was characterized by an increase in public spending and a
decrease in poverty, which went from 13% to 7%, while increasing the
minimum wage by 250%. In terms of social work, his government was
characterized by offering housing to families who did not have a home. To
obtain funds, Mujica himself donated 87% of his salary to a fund that was
also fed by the solidarity contributions of several companies, as well as
thanks to the sale of State properties.

Regarding the expansion of rights, he supported the expansion of
reproductive rights, marriage as a civil union between people regardless of
their sex. His proposal to legalize the consumption of marijuana for
recreational purposes was controversial. Mujica argued
<https://www.bbc.com/mundo/articles/cvgmg23j7d5o> that this measure sought
to eliminate the power of drug trafficking: “What scares me is drug
trafficking, not drugs. And by repressive means, it is a lost war: it is
being lost everywhere.”

He was also one of the main promoters of the Uruguayan state’s recognition
of the persecution, torture, and murder of dozens of left-wing party
militants during the 20th century, especially during the military
dictatorship (1973-1985). Thus, he promoted and strengthened the policy of
recovery of historical memory, which today has become an important public
policy of the State.
*Final years*

Once his term as president ended, Mujica was elected senator during the
2015-2020 and 2020-2025 terms, although in 2020 he resigned from office due
to the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite speculation of a possible return to
Executive politics as Secretary of Agriculture and Livestock, he rejected
such a possibility.

In 2024, he announced that he was suffering from esophageal cancer, and in
2025, he reported that the malignant cells had spread to other parts of the
body, so he was simply “waiting for the inevitable”. Despite this, he
played an important role in the last presidential election, in which the
Broad Front reconquered the government with Yamandú Orsi after the
right-wing government of Lacalle Pou. Mujica, thanks to his great
popularity, participated in several rallies in which he called for support
for Orsi and for the Broad Front to return to the executive.

On May 13, Mujica died from cancer, leaving his supporters without one of
the most important references that the Broad Front had during its history.
Indeed, Mujica became the most emblematic national and international image
of the unity of the Uruguayan anti-neoliberal political parties. His short
and incisive phrases are still remembered as examples of Socratic wisdom
that seem to come out of ancient history books, but that express the
enormous impact of his political coherence and sensitivity.

In a political rally, in front of Broad Front militants, he said
<https://www.bbc.com/mundo/articles/cvgmg23j7d5o>: “I am an old man who is
very close to undertaking the retreat from which there is no return. But I
am happy because you are there, because when my arms leave, there will be
thousands of arms replacing me.”

Thus, Mujica will remain a symbol and a legend in Uruguayan history; a sort
of example that, as he stated, few were willing to follow. In this sense,
Mujica expressed <https://www.bbc.com/mundo/articles/cvgmg23j7d5o> in his
words an ironic satisfaction before life and an incredulity before a world
that seems to become more complex, even though, as the ex-guerrilla himself
stated, perhaps what we need is to stop and look at ourselves deeply: “You
are going to grow old and you are going to have wrinkles, and one day you
are going to look in the mirror and you will have to ask yourself, on that
day, if you betrayed the child you had inside you.”
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