On Wednesday (14), thousands of Uruguayans took to the streets of the country’s capital, Montevideo, to bid farewell to former President José “Pepe” Mujica, who died at the age of 89 the previous day. With the city’s main avenue, July 18, closed for the funeral procession, the crowd followed the horse-drawn coffin for about three hours towards the Legislative Palace, where the vigil will take place.
In the streets of the Uruguayan capital, BdF was able to observe the sadness throughout the procession that “protected” the vehicle carrying Mujica’s body with a human cordon formed by people holding hands.
The respectful silence was sometimes broken by clapping or shouts of “thank you, Pepe”. Isabel Maria, a pensioner, told BdF that Mujica’s death was “a huge pain”. “Of course it was expected because he was very ill, but it’s still a loss that hurts and hurts a lot,” she says.
“He’s a benchmark for honesty, empathy and coherence. As he used to say, ‘I live as I think, I think as I live.’ I thank President Lula for his words to our people and everything he said about Pepe.”
In a statement issued on Pepe’s death, Lula said: “I know many people, presidents, politicians, but none can match the greatness of Pepe Mujica’s soul.”
“Mujica was the greatest of them all. We lived in the same neighborhood and fought successfully together against privatization when I was a trade unionist. We were a real government,” Roberto Ferradan, an 82-year-old Uruguayan pensioner and friend of the former president, he told BdF.
Sandra Ferreira, 59, said that Mujica was more than a president, “He was a friend, a worker.”
“Thanks to him I was able to get a decent job. He helped single women a lot, as well as all the Uruguayan people. He’ll go down in the history books as a reference for a long time,” she said.
Reactions
Living an austere lifestyle, faithful to an anti-consumerist rhetoric, José Mujica died in his modest home on the outskirts of Montevideo, the place he had chosen, accompanied by his wife and former Uruguayan vice-president, Lucía Topolansky.
“We’ll miss you dearly, ‘Old Man,'” wrote Uruguayan president Yamandú Orsi on X when announcing Pepe’s death.
Orsi and Topolansky opened the funeral procession on Wednesday at 10 a.m. local time from the Presidential Palace to the Legislative Palace. The departure of the “world’s poorest president”, as he was often described in international headlines, triggered a wave of messages from Latin American leaders and important names on the international left.
In addition to Lula, who will attend the funeral on his return from China, Chilean President Gabriel Boric, who has often expressed his admiration for Mujica and visited him in February, also spared no praise.
“Pepe, dear, I imagine that you are leaving worried about the bitterness of the world today. But if you’ve left us anything, it’s the unshakable hope that it’s possible to make things better,” he said.
In a more formal tone, former Argentinian president Cristina Kirchner, with whom Mujica had differences, said “Latin America is saying goodbye to a great man who dedicated his life to militancy and Uruguay”.
Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez stressed that the Mujica believed in “a better world”.
