Last tribute to “Hebe”, pioneer of the Mothers of the Place de Mai
Thousands of Argentines came to witness Thursday the dispersion in Buenos Aires of the ashes of Hebe de Bonafini, historical figure of the “Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo”.
Hebe de Bonafini was 39 years old when in 1977 the “Guerra Sucia” (Dirty War) of the dictatorship turned his life upside down.
AFP
On “his” Place, forever. Thousands of Argentines attended Thursday in Buenos Aires the scattering of the ashes of Hebe de Bonafini, historical figure of the “Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo”, in the very place where for decades they shot, shot, to know the fate of their disappeared under the dictatorship.
She came for the last time, on November 10, authorized by her doctors despite the fragility that took her away ten days later, at 93 years old. “Because they know it’s good for my health, that I need the Place to take care of myself,” she then smiled.
On Thursday, five of her sisters — Visitacion, Josefa, Irene, Sara, Carmen — among the last of an aging army, the white scarf as always tied on the head (symbolizing the nappies of missing children) laid her ashes on a square of greenery, at the foot of the obelisk in Plaza de Mayo, facing the Presidency.
“War dirty”
“30,000 times thank you!” (for the 30,000 disappeared or killed under the dictatorship, according to the NGOs), “If there is struggle, there is hope”, “Our struggle has no expiry date”… Banners, placards, Messages hung on the railings of the obelisk echoed Hebe’s words, expressed gratitude for his tireless fight.
Hebe de Bonafini was 39 years old when in 1977 the “Guerra Sucia” (Dirty War) of the dictatorship turned his life upside down. Her sons, Jorge, Raul, were abducted a few months apart, then Jorge’s wife in 1978. Distraught, Hebe then saw a mother of the disappeared offer her to join a rally in front of the Pink House, the seat of the Argentine executive power. Beginning of a fight that only death, she said, could stop.
And for more than 40 years, every Thursday at 3:30 p.m., “Mothers” and sympathizers circled around the obelisk, as the quest for the missing continues. Thursday was the “Marche N.2328”, and after the scattering of the ashes, the “Mothers” briefly turned, on foot, transported for the most frail. Then thousands of people took a circuit, widened for the occasion to the large neighboring avenues.
In the crowd, a militant atmosphere, embodied by many elected officials or Peronist organizations, but also anonymous people with reddened eyes, including many contemporaries of the fear under the junta (1976-1983), and the first “rounds” of Hebe.
“All lost, nothing to lose”
“For me Hebe is a heroine,” Virginia Garcia, 42, of the Barrios de Pie association told AFP, “because looking for the missing is something that few people dared to do.” “This struggle is not over, it is eternal because there is still a lot of pain. It doesn’t heal, it’s an open wound, ”says Martha Cervantes, 77, whose boyfriend is one of the missing. “But we have democracy thanks to these women. To all of them”.
Because of course, there were the “dissensions”, the controversies around Hebe, to the very politicized association (blindly pro-Kirchner), branching off towards the denunciation of all types of oppression, and split from the “Mothers of the Place of May-Line founding”. There was his defense of the Chavez and Maduro regimes in Venezuela, his reaction without empathy to September 11, 2001, the procedure for embezzlement of funds at his foundation…
But not enough to sully his pioneering struggle, the challenge to the junta. “What we celebrate today is his legacy. Hebe was a great fighter, very frontal. She did not back down from anyone,” remembered Angela Cardella, 82, who spent the dictatorship in “internal exile”, in a village far from Buenos Aires, to escape the fate of “subversives”. Hebe “said that she had lost everything (her children), and therefore had nothing more to lose”, added Angela, who had often come over the years to walk alongside the “Mothers”.
AFP
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