MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (AP) — Former Uruguayan President José Mujica, a onetime Marxist guerilla and flower farmer whose radical brand of democracy, plain-spoken philosophy and simple lifestyle fascinated people around the world, has died. He was 89.
Uruguay's left-wing president, Yamandú Orsi, announced his death, which came four months after Mujica decided to forgo further medical treatment for esophageal cancer and enter hospice care at his three-room ranch house on the outskirts of Montevideo, Uruguay’s capital.
“President, activist, guide and leader,” Orsi wrote of his longtime political mentor on social media. “We will miss you greatly, dear old man. Thank you for everything you gave us and for your profound love for your people.”
Mujica had been under treatment for cancer of the esophagus since spring 2024, when the affliction was diagnosed. His doctor reported that radiation had succeeded in eliminating much of the tumor but Mujica’s autoimmune disease complicated his recovery. In January, Mujica’s doctor announced that the cancer in his esophagus had returned and spread to his liver.
A colorful history and simple philosophy
As leader of a violent leftist guerrilla group in the 1960s known as the Tupamaros, Mujica robbed banks, planted bombs and abducted businessmen and politicians on Montevideo’s streets in hopes of provoking a popular uprising that would lead to a Cuban-style socialist Uruguay.
A brutal counterinsurgency and ensuing right-wing military dictatorship that ruled Uruguay between 1973 and 1985 sent him to prison for nearly 15 years, 10 of which he spent in solitary confinement.
During his 2010-2015 presidency, Mujica, widely known as “Pepe,” oversaw the transformation of his small South American nation into one of the world’s healthiest and most socially liberal democracies. He earned admiration at home and cult status abroad for legalizing marijuana and same-sex marriage, enacting the region’s first sweeping abortion rights law and establishing Uruguay as a leader in alternative energy.
Through his remarkable political journey, Mujica captivated audiences with his humble tone, austere lifestyle and ideological earnestness.
Shunning the pomp and circumstance of the presidency, he drove a beat-up 1987 Volkswagen Beetle, wore rumpled cardigan sweaters and leather sandals with black socks and lived in a tiny tin-roof house outside Montevideo, where for decades he tended to chrysanthemums for sale in local markets.
“This is the tragedy of life, on the one hand it’s beautiful, but it ends,” Mujica told The Associated Press from his farmhouse in an October 2023 interview. “Therefore, paradise is here. As is hell.”
Tributes poured in from presidents, world leaders and ordinary people from around the world. The first to share remembrances were allied leaders who recalled not only Mujica's accomplishments but also his hallowed status as one of the last surviving lions of the now-receding Latin American left that peaked when he assumed office two decades ago.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro praised Mujica as a “great revolutionary." Bolivia’s former socialist president, Evo Morales said that he “and all of Latin America" are in mourning. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum called Mujica “an example for Latin America and the entire world.”
From robbing banks to running Uruguay
Mujica never attended university and didn’t finish high school. But politics piqued his interest as early as adolescence, when the young flower farmer joined the progressive wing of the conservative National Party, one of the two main parties in Uruguay. His dramatic pivot to urban guerrilla warfare came in the 1960s, as leftist struggles swept the region in the wake of the Cuban Revolution.
He and other student and labor radicals launched the Tupamaros National Liberation Movement, which quickly gained notoriety for its brazen Robin Hood-style exploits aimed at installing a revolutionary government.
