Death of Hebe de Bonafini, standard bearer of the Mothers of the Place de Mai
Died Sunday at the age of 93, she was the voice of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, who defied the military dictatorship (1976-1983) by demanding news of their missing.
Hebe de Bonafini in 1998.
AFP
Launched on April 30, 1977, their weekly patrol in Buenos Aires in front of the Casa Rosada (Pink House, headquarters of the Executive), wearing a white headscarf reminiscent of swaddling clothes and embroidered with the name of a missing person (some 30,000 people , according to aid organizations), shone the spotlight on the junta.
“Dearest Hebe, Mother of Plaza de Mayo, global symbol of the struggle for human rights, pride of Argentina. God reminded you of National Sovereignty Day (a public holiday in Argentina)… It must not be a coincidence. Just thank you and goodbye,” Argentine Vice-President Cristina Kirchner said on Sunday.
Shortly after, Alejandra Bonafini announced in a statement that her mother had died at the Italian Hospital of La Plata, in the province of Buenos Aires, where she had been admitted a few days ago. The organization, which she chaired for more than forty years, said on Sunday evening that “her ashes will rest in the Place de Mai”.
Deuil national
Argentine President Alberto Fernández hailed “the tireless fighter for human rights”, decreeing three days of national mourning in her honor.
On Twitter, Bolivian President Evo Morales said he was “very sad and appalled” by the news. “His tireless fight against dictatorships, for memory, truth and justice is an example for new generations”.
Born on December 4, 1928 in Ensenada, near La Plata into a modest family, married at 14 and having only known primary school, she was 39 when the Guerra Sucia (the Dirty War) upset her life and that of of his three children.
In 1977, his two sons were kidnapped, Jorge Omar (February 8), Raúl Alfredo (December 6) and then Jorge’s wife, María Elena Bugnone Cepeda (May 25, 1978). Hebe Pastor de Bonafini doesn’t know who to turn to when a mother of a missing man asks him to join a rally in front of the Casa Rosada. It is the beginning of a fight that only death, she says, can stop.
In addition to forty years of gatherings, Hebe de Bonafini and the Madres de Plaza de Mayo had to their credit twenty-five years of “resistance marches” of twenty-four hours in a row, until January 26, 2006, when they admitted to being overcome by age.
Today, the Mothers, led by Bonafini’s combative Hebe Pastor since 1979, still meet on Thursdays in front of the obelisk in Plaza de Mayo, but now to denounce all forms of oppression, a development which, in 1986, caused their split.
The association of Mothers of the Place de Mai-founding line, chaired by Estela Barnes de Carlotto, is dedicated purely to the defense of human rights, while that of Hebe de Bonafini is more politicized.
Controversial
After rejoicing at the attacks of September 11, 2001 in the United States, she reacted to the deadly attack on the French satirical weekly “Charlie Hebdo” in January 2015, believing that “colonialist France, which left country in ruins does not have the moral authority to speak of criminal terrorism. Ask the Algerians, the Haitians and its dozens of colonies.”
A defender of the Chávez and then Maduro regimes in Venezuela, she had also become a controversial figure in Argentina for her unwavering support for the Kirchner spouses.
The foundation she headed, Rêves solidaires des Mères, became, under the presidency of Nestor and then of Cristina Kirchner, an NGO with 6,000 employees, receiving from the State a total of 129 million euros for the construction, in particular, social housing and hospitals.
In 2017, a scandal involving her power of attorney, suspected of money laundering, splashed her, as well as her daughter Alejandra Bonafini, then director of the foundation, and several government officials. She then denounced a political “manoeuvre” by President Mauricio Macri (2015-2019) whom she described as an “enemy”.
AFP
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