The former president emotionally referred to his 2010 running mate and regretted a conversation that was pending: “I couldn’t say it to him but I’m telling it to the Uruguayan people.”
The former president of Uruguay José Mujica referred to the death of Danilo Astori, referent of Wide Front and who was his vice president between 2010 and 2015: “A piece of ourselves left,” he acknowledged, visibly moved.
The leader of Popular Participation Movement (MPP) was consulted by TV Ciudad about his feelings regarding the news of the death of the 83-year-old former vice president and former Minister of Economy, who had been going through serious health problems. He acknowledged speaking from “the heart and not so much from the thought” given the recentness of the event. “A piece of ourselves is gone, a piece of our head, also a piece of our feelings,” said the Broad Front leader.
Likewise, he described Astori as “a formidable companion in the management of the entire epic of the Front, representative of an important sector of society.” Mujica also highlighted his “thinking head that was permanently there to moderate us and help us reflect a little in the long term”, realizing one of the characteristics of the leader of Uruguay Assembly which was also recognized by the entire political spectrum.
“I am deeply sorry and I am even more sorry because I had a talk with him pending and it could not happen.” Asked about the topic of that conversation, the former president acknowledged that “I had to thank him and wanted to acknowledge that at a crucial moment I should have supported him, in ’14, for him to be a candidate.” “I couldn’t say it to him but I tell him Uruguayan people”, Mujica expressed.
A legacy in the Frente Amplio
Astori was one of the founders of the Frente Amplio in 1971. Although he entered the Senate for the first time in 1990, a position for which he was elected in 1989 when he joined the presidential ticket with Liber Seregni —as a candidate for vice president— and headed all the lists for the Upper House.
Jazz lover and fan of National, The former vice president of the Republic earned the recognition of all political sectors, from his place as a reference for the moderate Frente Amplistas wing, which even led him to oppose his co-religionists on occasions such as his support for the constitutional reform of 1996 that introduced the ballot to the electoral system—something that the majority of the leaders of the left coalition opposed.
As Minister of Economy in the two administrations of Tabare Vazquez At the head of the government, Astori became a “guarantee of stability” and a sign of moderation for opponents. In 2018 the international magazine Global Markets distinguished him as the Finance Minister of the Year in Latin America. His team included both the Broad Front senator Mario Bergara —to whom he had given his support in the face of internal party elections for the 2024 elections—, as the current Minister of Economy and Finance Azucena Arbeleche.
In November 2022, finally, the Broad Front leader took a step aside from his political career that, at that time, he exercised as a senator: his health problems kept him largely absent from his seat in the Upper House of the legislature made up of the government of Luis Lacalle Pou —he attended only three of the 120 sessions that had elapsed since February 15, 2020—, so he decided to resign from the position for which he had been elected.
Source: Ambito
