Φεουδαλισμός και δημοκρατία
Mr. Mujica entered politics in the 1960s as a bank-robbing leftist guerrilla. His group, the Tupamaros, gained notoriety for their violence. Mr. Mujica said they tried to avoid harming civilians, but added that the leftist struggle sometimes required force.
After escaping prison twice, he was imprisoned for 14 years under Uruguay’s military dictatorship, much of his sentence spent in solitary confinement. Trapped in a hole in the ground, he said, he befriended rats and a small frog to survive psychologically.
Στον φάκελο του «τι έμαθα σήμερα», η ιστορία του José “Pepe” Mujica, του πρώην προέδρου της Ουρουγουάης ο οποίος έφυγε από τη ζωή προχθές στα 89 του.
[..] when he became president of his small South American nation in 2010, Mr. Mujica decided he would commute from his home: a cluttered, three-room shack the size of a studio apartment, crammed with a wood stove, overstuffed bookcases and jars of pickling vegetables.
“The cultural remnants of feudalism remain — inside the republic. The red carpet, the bugles when the feudal lord came out of the castle onto the bridge. All that remains,” he said. “The president likes to be praised.”
Το προεδρικό μέγαρο έμεινε αχρησιμοποίητο. Το ενδιαφέρον είναι ότι φαίνεται ότι δημιουργήθηκε μια παράδοση που ο επόμενος πρόεδρος νιώθει πίεση να τη διατηρήσει.
Earlier this year, his political protégé, a former history teacher named Yamandú Orsi, took office as Uruguay’s new president. He has commuted to work from his family home, and Uruguay’s presidential mansion has mostly remained empty.