This article was originally published in The Ascent on 19th March 2019

JOSE MUJICA: A TRAGIC STRUGGLE TO THE TOP OF THE PRESIDENTIAL MOUNTAIN

”When you have a lot of solitude, any living thing becomes a companion.”
- Jose Mujica

My interest in Uruguay, and its history, has stretched back at least three decades.

It all started in 1986 when I first saw the Uruguayan international footballer, Enzo Francescoli, perform at that year’s World Cup in Mexico. The Uruguayan team, unfortunately, was knocked out in the last sixteen against their South American rivals, Argentina, captained by the mercurial Diego Maradona. Francescoli, South American player of the year in ’84, didn’t play as some had been anticipating. Much of it, I suspect, was because of the way he was marked, or practically hacked to death, by rival defenders.

After that my fascination with Uruguayan football and the country grew. It was compounded, ten years later, while I was working at a YMCA in the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. I had the pleasure there to meet my first Uruguayan in the flesh, Juan, whose last name I can’t recall.

Juan was on a gap year from his studies of history at the Universidad de la República (the University of the Republic) in Montevideo, the country’s most prestigious university. It was he who gave me my first real education of Uruguay and its people — as up to that point I’d only been able to read stuff from encyclopedias and fragments of news. These were the days before Google and the Internet made it easy to research for information, so resources, especially about a tiny South American country, were at a premium.

After I left the United States and went to Poland in the autumn of 1998, I lost contact with Juan, and the fascination with his country waned somewhat. It wasn’t until 2010, and the election of José Mujica as the country’s president, that my enthusiasm was piqued again. Not long after I started writing notes for an idea that would one day metamorphize into my novel, The Red Masks of Montevideo, which I published earlier this year.

Juan had told me about the Tupamaros, or MLN-T (Movimiento de Liberación Nacional-Tupamaros (Tupamaros National Liberation Movement), a left-wing urban guerrilla movement that was active in the 1960s to the early 1970s, which Mujica had joined as a young man and, eventually, imprisoned for being a part of.

Known as ‘the poorest president’ for his humble attitude and lifestyle (he refused to live in the presidential palace and lives in the small farm owned by his wife Lucia Topolansky), a new film about him and his comrades, A Twelve-Year Night, directed by Álvaro Brechner, dramatizes the 12 years in prison, from 1972 to 1985, members of the Tupamaros had to endure. It particularly focuses on Mujica, played by Spanish actor Antonio de la Torre and Mauricio Rosencof, portrayed by Chino Darín, an Argentine.

The film, similar in vein toPapillon and the Birdman of Alcatraz, is hard watching at times, yet depicts the constant torment the revolutionaries went through during the hours, days and years of solitary confinement and their treatment at the hands of the prison guards.

‘Pepe’, as he is affectionately known, climbed to the pinnacle of his country’s political life after suffering torture, beatings, and mental health issues while incarcerated.

And it has made him a stronger man, and, no doubt, a more compassionate president.

Mujica, who was president from 2010 to 2015, was a breath of fresh air. A change to the traditional leadership of other countries in Latin America. A minority, though, were against him during his term. Thoughts of leaders such as Evo Morales in Bolivia and his land reform; or earlier, with the Venezuelan socialist warrior Hugo Chávez’s Bolivarian class struggle with the ruling elite, scared moderate Uruguayans, who believed their country was heading in the same direction.

There was no red terror. No Venezuela scenario.

However, Mujica’s time as the country’s leader, by political analysts at home and abroad, wasn’t deemed a success. His humble, idealist and likeable persona notwithstanding, most normal Uruguayans believe he ultimately left his country in a worse state than when he arrived. High public debt, a rise in the cost of living and ignorance of the basics of economic theory are the legacy of his tenure. The legalization of gay marriage and marihuana, to the liberals at least, seemed lofty actions, but in the grander scheme did little to change the social fabric of the nation.

Political scientist Adolfo Garcé, speaking on an SBS Dateline programme in 2014, had this to say about Mujica:

“Sometimes I think he escaped from a book, a very old book… He is all the time talking, talking, talking, talking, talking… talking about problems, and maybe citizens need leaders solving problems, not talking about problems… And this is a problem for Mujica… A good man, a dreamer, a romantic, and maybe a chaotic leader. Very sensitive to poor people, but citizens need more than good intentions…”

Garceé’s summary of the man is the correct one. Good intentions, invariably, never lead to good results, especially in the political world, but they cannot be a portrait of a great man, a man who feels love for his fellow human beings, an individual, who has been, one can say, to the nine circles of hell ten times over.

Whatever the beliefs of his supporters or detractors, one thing that cannot be taken away from the man is the humanity that dominates his heart and soul.

This is encapsulated in these words:

“I spent almost ten years in solitary, in a hole. Plenty of time to think… I spent seven years without one book! That left me time to think. And this is what I discovered: Either you’re happy with very little, free of all the extra luggage, because you have happiness inside, or you won’t get anywhere…”

The ex-president — now an overweight, wrinkled 83-year-old — is a far cry from the svelte guerrilla arrested during his Tupamaros days, but says he feels no ill will towards his captors.

When questioned about it, Mujica answered:

“I haven’t forgiven but I don’t have any score to settle. I have to live. Because nobody can compensate us for what we have lost. You have to learn that this is the law of life. In life you can fall down 1000 times but the point is to have the willingness to stand up again and start again.”

Noble words, no doubt.

During his years in prison, Mujica managed to escape at least twice. The year 1973, however, saw a coup d’état. President Juan María Bordaberry, along with a military junta, closed the parliament and ruled the country with an iron fist. Unluckily, Mujica and eight others — who were of special interest to the junta — spent years being rotated around military barracks in secret where they were held captive.

It is reported that during the Tupamaros armed insurrection with the state, some 3000 people spent time in jail, while ten percent of those died while in custody.

Comparisons can be made to Argentina’s Dirty War just across the border, which started at approximately the same time. The Montoneros, the Argentine equivalent of the Tupamaros, lost thousands — some modern claims report that the human rights violations from the 1976-1983 dictatorship are well over 20,000 people missing, presumed murdered.

This creates the belief that what happened in Uruguay was small change compared to what occurred in Argentina. And quantifying the numbers, the statistics do not lie. Nevertheless, Mujica and his experiences cannot be ignored.

What happened to him, both while in solitary confinement and during the continuous, systematic beatings and torture sessions he underwent, shaped the man who was to become the president of his country. A Twelve-Year Night, though an artistic account of what happened with all the subjectivity of cinematographic sentiment and dialogue (or the lack of it), is a beautiful reconstruction of historical events.

José Alberto Mujica Cordano is a man created by his environment, but one who has never given up on the spirit of humanity.

Gracias Juan for the insight!

Gracias Pepe for your existence!

The Ascent