‘My cycle is over,’ says leftwinger, 89, who lives humbly and oversaw one of healthiest and most liberal democracies. José Mujica, the former guerrilla who became Uruguay’s president and a global progressive icon, has announced that the cancer in his oesophagus has spread to his liver, and that he has chosen to forgo further treatment.
In what Mujica said would be his last interview, he told Búsqueda, a weekly news magazine in Uruguay, that he was “doomed”. “Honestly, I am dying,” said the former leader, who governed the small South American country of Uruguay from 2010 to 2015. The article noted that he had tears in his eyes.
“What I ask is that they leave me alone. Don’t ask me for more interviews or anything else,” he said. “My cycle is over.”. Mujica first entered politics as a leader of the Tupamaros, a Marxist militant group that drew inspiration from the Cuban revolution.
Later, as Uruguay’s 40th president, he transformed his nation into one of the healthiest and most socially liberal democracies in Latin America, legalizing abortion, same-sex marriage and recreational marijuana. He sparked global fascination by shunning the presidential palace to live in a tiny farmhouse and donating most of his salary to charity.
The 89-year-old first revealed last April that doctors had found a cancerous tumour in his oesophagus. He underwent radiotherapy, and, last September, Mujica’s doctors said the oesophageal cancer appeared to have gone into remission. Although the radiation left him weak and almost unable to eat, Mujica reappeared on the political stage last fall, campaigning for his leftwing coalition, the Broad Front, in drama-free national elections that affirmed Uruguay as one of the region’s strongest democracies.
