Jorge Eliécer Gaitán
Encyclopedia
Jorge Eliécer Gaitán Ayala (January 23, 1903 – April 9, 1948) was a politician, a leader of a populist
movement in Colombia
, a former Education Minister (1940) and Labor Minister (1943–1944), mayor of Bogotá
(1936) and one of the most charismatic leaders of the Liberal Party.
He was assassinated during his second presidential
campaign in 1948, setting off the Bogotazo
and leading to a violent period of political unrest in Colombian history known as La Violencia
(approx. 1948 to 1958).
He attained a degree in law (1924) and later became a professor in the National University of Colombia
. In 1926 he completed a doctorate
in jurisprudence
in Italy at the Royal University of Rome
. While attending, the chair of his department, Professor Enrico Ferri
, appreciated the innovative ideas of Gaitán and incorporated some of his work into a volume on Criminology
.
.
Gaitán increased his nationwide popularity following a banana workers' strike in Magdalena
in 1928, in which strikers were fired upon by the army on the orders of the United Fruit Company
, resulting in numerous deaths. Gaitán used his skills as a lawyer and as an emerging politician in order to defend workers' rights and called for accountability to those involved in the Santa Marta Massacre
. Public support soon shifted toward Gaitán, Gaitán's Liberal Party won the 1930 presidential election.
In 1933 he created the "Unión Nacional Izquierdista Revolucionaria" ("National Leftist Revolutionary Union"), or UNIR, as his own dissident political movement after breaking with the Liberal Party.
, often classified as populist
by contemporaries and by later analysts, which attracted hundreds of thousands of union members and low-income Colombians at the time. When he was a student in Rome he was influenced by Benito Mussolini
's techniques for mobilising the people. Bernstein considered that the promises that he made to the people were as important to his appeal as his impressive public speaking skills, promises that Bernstein felt made him almost a demagogue, and which led Bernstein to compare him with Juan Perón
of Argentina.
In particular, he repeatedly divided the country into the oligarchy
and the people
, calling the former corrupt and the latter admirable, worthy, and deserving of Colombia's moral restoration. He stirred the audience's emotions by aggressively denouncing social, moral and economical evils stemming both from the Liberal and Conservative political parties, promising his supporters that a better future was possible if they all worked together against such evils.
In 1946, Gaitán referred to the difference between what he called the "political country" and the "national country". Accordingly, the "political country" was controlled by the interests of the oligarchy and its internal struggles, therefore it did not properly respond to the real demands of the "national country"; that is, the country made up of citizens in need of better socioeconomic conditions and greater sociopolitical freedom.
He was criticized by the more orthodox sectors of the Colombian Liberal Party
(who considered him too unruly), most of the Colombian Conservative Party
, the leadership of the Colombian Communist Party
(who saw him as a competitor for the political affections of the masses). Gaitán was warned by U.S. Ambassador Beaulac on March 24, 1948 that Communists were planning a disruption of the impending conference and that his Liberal Party would likely be blamed.
Gaitán's view of the 'people' has been considered as profoundly ambivalent by some later analysts. It is argued that, while he claimed to champion their cause, he did not see them as a social or political force capable of governing. There are instances in which he referred to the masses in explicitly pathological terms (as 'syphilitics' and 'alcoholics'), while in others he praised their virtues. This ambivalence, according to some analysts, could partly explain the extreme acts of savagery perpetrated by the peasantry during La Violencia.
The subject of future land reform
was also prominent in some of his speeches.
Gaitán was named Minister of Education in 1940 under the administration of the Liberal Party's Eduardo Santos
(1938–1942), where he promoted an extensive literacy
campaign as well as cultural activities.
At the conclusion of the Liberal Party's national convention in 1945 he was proclaimed as "the people's candidate" in a public square, an unusual setting under the political customs at the time.
The Liberal Party was defeated in the May 1946 elections by the Conservative's Mariano Ospina Pérez
(565,939 votes, president from 1946 to 1950) due to its own internal divisions, evidenced by its presenting two different candidates, Gaitán (358,957 votes) and Gabriel Turbay (441,199 votes), in that year's race.
Gaitán became leader of the Colombian Liberal Party in 1947, when his supporters gained the upper hand in the elections for seats in Congress
. This would have allowed for the Liberal Party to present a single candidate for the 1950 elections.
. Dr. Gaitán was then the leading opponent for the use of violence and had determined to pursue the strategy of electing a left-wing government, and he had repudiated the violent Communist revolutionary approach typical of the Cold War
era. His assassination directly lead to a period of great violence between conservatives and liberals and also facilitated the rise of the currently existing Communist guerrillas. Over the next fifteen years as many as 200,000 people died due to the disorders that followed his assassination.
Dr. Gaitán's alleged murderer, Juan Roa Sierra
, was killed by an enraged mob and his motivations were never known. Many different entities and individuals have been held responsible as the alleged plotters, including his different critics, but so far no definite information has come forward and a number of theories persist. Among them, there are versions which, sometimes conflictingly, implicate the government of Mariano Ospina Pérez
, sectors of the Liberal party, the USSR the Colombian Communist Party
, the CIA and others in the crime.
One of the persons supporting the theory of some sort of CIA involvement in Gaitán's murder is Gloria Gaitán , who was 11 years old when her father was murdered. According to one version of this theory, Juan Roa Sierra acted under the orders of CIA agents John Mepples Espirito (alias Georgio Ricco) and Tomás Elliot, as part of an anti-leftist plan supposedly called Operation Pantomime
. It is claimed that this would also have involved the complicity of the then Chief of Police, who would allegedly have ordered two police officers to abandon Juan Roa Sierra to be killed by the mob (a claim which conflicts with mainstream accounts of Roa Sierra's death). An eyewitness to the actual events, Guillermo Perez Sarmiento, Director of the United Press in Colombia, stated that upon his arrival Roa was already "between two policemen" and describes in detail the angry mob that kicked and "tore him to pieces" and does not suggest any police involvement.
Nathaniel Weyl documents the assassination claims then made by Rafael Azula Barrera and the President of Colombia Mariano Ospina Pérez
that Gaitán was assassinated as part of a Cold War
conspiracy led by the USSR to increase Soviet influence in the Caribbean. The violent disruption of the 1948 Inter-American Conference and the violent deaths of a thousand people was alleged to also have been part of a Cold War conspiracy by agents of the USSR that allegedly included the then low-level Soviet agent Fidel Castro
. According to police records Fidel Castro
was suspected of personally assassinating Gaitán, as his Cuban travelling companion, Rafael del Pino was seen with the fascist former mental patient, Juan Roa, an hour and a half before the assassination. Castro had attempted to recruit Gaitán earlier to his cause, but Gaitán had repeatedly declined and was assassinated because he was too politically influential and would have countered the Cold War objectives of the USSR in the Caribbean..
Another theory states that Juan Roa simply got tired and disenchanted of lobbying Jorge Eliécer Gaitán to get a job. He had a history of job instability and considered that he could get a position worthy of his status as a reincarnation of Santander and Quesada. He had an initial conversation with Jorge Eliécer and was advised to write a letter to the President, which he did, but still did not get a job. After that, he had visited Jorge Eliécer Gaitán's office several times in the two months prior to the assassination. The revolver was purchased two days before the assassination and the ammunition the day before. It was only on his last visit, on April 9, when the secretary finally wrote his name to be considered by Jorge Eliécer.
Nathaniel Weyl documents an alternative claim by the Colombian President and others, that Roa was influenced by others and perhaps did not commit any crime at all. He discusses the questions of Milton Bracker of the New York Times and U.S. Ambassador Willard L. Beaulac if Roa had acted on his own. Ambassador Beaulac then speculated that Roa was simply used to cover the identity of the real assassins. The President of Colombia Mariano Ospina Pérez
and the Colombian General Secretary Rafael Azula Barrera considered the evidence that the revolver Roa had carried was incapable of accurate fire, that Roa was not thought to have any firearms training, and that no eyewitness saw Roa anywhere near the assassination, that he was first seen between two policemen. From this evidence the government of Colombia concluded that the impoverished Roa with his diminished mental capacities had been paid to stand near the event with a recently fired revolver.
Other details which have interested historians and researchers include the fact that Gaitán was murdered in the middle of the 9th Pan-American Conference
, which was being led by U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall
, a meeting which led to a pledge by members to fight communism
in the Americas
, as well as the creation of the Organization of American States
.
Another event in the country's capital Bogotá
was taking place at the time: a Latin American Youth Congress, organized to protest the Pan American conference. This meeting was organized by a young Fidel Castro
, and was funded by Perón
. Castro had an appointment to meet Gaitán, whom he very much admired, later in the afternoon on the day of his murder, and had also met with Gaitán two days earlier. It appears that Gaitán was contemplating supporting this conference. Gaitán commanded large audiences when he spoke and was one of the most influential men in the country.
The assassination provoked a violent riot known as the Bogotazo
(loose translation: the sack of Bogotá, or shaking of Bogotá), and a further ten years of violence during which at least 300,000 people died (a period known as La Violencia
). Some writers say that this event influenced Castro's views about the viability of an electoral route for political change.
Also in the city that day was another young man who would become a giant of 20th century Latin-American history: Colombian writer and Nobel Prize Laureate Gabriel García Márquez
. A young law student and short story writer at the time, García Márquez was eating lunch near the scene of the assassination. He arrived on the scene shortly after the shooting and witnessed the murder of Gaitán's presumed assassin at the hands of enraged bystanders. García Márquez discusses this day at vivid length in the first volume of his memoirs, Living to Tell the Tale
. In his book, he describes a well-dressed man who eggs on the mob before fleeing in a luxurious car that arrived just as the presumed assassin was being dragged away.
As Gaitan was not able to have a proper funeral because of the chaotic public order, his relatives were forced to bury him in his own house, now known as House Museum Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, where his remains are still resting. Subsequently, the bipartisan violence would spread to other regions during the period known as La Violencia.
A popular story, perhaps apocryphal, relates that during a debate with the Conservative candidate for president, Gaitán asked him how he made his living.
"From the land", the other candidate replied.
"Ah, and how did you get this land?" asked Gaitán.
"I inherited it from my father!"
"And where did he get it from?"
"He inherited it from his father!"
The question is repeated once or twice more, and then the Conservative candidate concedes, "We took it from the Natives".
Gaitán's reply was, "Well, we want to do the opposite: we want to give the land back to the Natives". (Gaitán advocated land reform
).
Populism
Populism can be defined as an ideology, political philosophy, or type of discourse. Generally, a common theme compares "the people" against "the elite", and urges social and political system changes. It can also be defined as a rhetorical style employed by members of various political or social...
movement in Colombia
Colombia
Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the...
, a former Education Minister (1940) and Labor Minister (1943–1944), mayor of Bogotá
Bogotá
Bogotá, Distrito Capital , from 1991 to 2000 called Santa Fé de Bogotá, is the capital, and largest city, of Colombia. It is also designated by the national constitution as the capital of the department of Cundinamarca, even though the city of Bogotá now comprises an independent Capital district...
(1936) and one of the most charismatic leaders of the Liberal Party.
He was assassinated during his second presidential
President of Colombia
The President of Colombia is the head of state and head of government of the Republic of Colombia. The office of president was established upon the ratification of the Constitution of 1819, by the Congress of Angostura, convened in December 1819, when Colombia was part of "la Gran Colombia"...
campaign in 1948, setting off the Bogotazo
Bogotazo
El Bogotazo refers to the massive riots that followed the assassination in Bogotá, Colombia of Liberal leader and presidential candidate Jorge Eliécer Gaitán on April 9, 1948 during the government of President Mariano Ospina Pérez...
and leading to a violent period of political unrest in Colombian history known as La Violencia
La Violencia
La Violencia is a period of civil conflict in the Colombian countryside between supporters of the Colombian Liberal Party and the Colombian Conservative Party, a conflict which took place roughly from 1948 to 1958 ....
(approx. 1948 to 1958).
Early life and education
Gaitán's family was from a poor background and their son entered formal education when he was eleven years old. He later had to face social tensions in the Colegio Simón Araújo school, considered as an institution for wealthier members of the Colombian Liberal Party. Gaitán ended his primary studies at the Colegio Martín Restrepo Mejía in 1920.He attained a degree in law (1924) and later became a professor in the National University of Colombia
National University of Colombia
The Universidad Nacional de Colombia , also called UNAL or just UN, is a public, national, coeducational, research university, located primarily in Bogotá, Medellín, Manizales and Palmira, Colombia...
. In 1926 he completed a doctorate
Doctorate
A doctorate is an academic degree or professional degree that in most countries refers to a class of degrees which qualify the holder to teach in a specific field, A doctorate is an academic degree or professional degree that in most countries refers to a class of degrees which qualify the holder...
in jurisprudence
Jurisprudence
Jurisprudence is the theory and philosophy of law. Scholars of jurisprudence, or legal theorists , hope to obtain a deeper understanding of the nature of law, of legal reasoning, legal systems and of legal institutions...
in Italy at the Royal University of Rome
University of Rome La Sapienza
The Sapienza University of Rome, officially Sapienza – Università di Roma, formerly known as Università degli studi di Roma "La Sapienza", is a coeducational, autonomous state university in Rome, Italy...
. While attending, the chair of his department, Professor Enrico Ferri
Enrico Ferri
Enrico Ferri was an Italian criminologist, socialist, and student of Cesare Lombroso. However, whereas Lombroso researched the physiological factors that motivated criminals, Ferri investigated social and economic factors. Ferri was the author of Criminal Sociology in 1884 and the editor for...
, appreciated the innovative ideas of Gaitán and incorporated some of his work into a volume on Criminology
Criminology
Criminology is the scientific study of the nature, extent, causes, and control of criminal behavior in both the individual and in society...
.
Early political career
Gaitán was active in local politics as early as 1919, when he was part of a protest movement against president Marco Fidel SuárezMarco Fidel Suárez
Marco Fidel Suárez was a Colombian political figure. He served as president of Colombia from 1918 to 1921. He was born on April 23, 1855, in the town of Hatoviejo, Antioquia...
.
Gaitán increased his nationwide popularity following a banana workers' strike in Magdalena
Magdalena Department
Magdalena is a department of Colombia, located to the north of the country by the Caribbean Sea. The capital of the Magdalena Department is Santa Marta and was named after the Magdalena River...
in 1928, in which strikers were fired upon by the army on the orders of the United Fruit Company
United Fruit Company
It had a deep and long-lasting impact on the economic and political development of several Latin American countries. Critics often accused it of exploitative neocolonialism and described it as the archetypal example of the influence of a multinational corporation on the internal politics of the...
, resulting in numerous deaths. Gaitán used his skills as a lawyer and as an emerging politician in order to defend workers' rights and called for accountability to those involved in the Santa Marta Massacre
Santa Marta Massacre
The Banana massacre, in Spanish, Matanza de las bananeras or Masacre de las bananeras was a massacre of workers for the United Fruit Company that occurred on December 6, 1928 in the town of Ciénaga near Santa Marta, Colombia...
. Public support soon shifted toward Gaitán, Gaitán's Liberal Party won the 1930 presidential election.
In 1933 he created the "Unión Nacional Izquierdista Revolucionaria" ("National Leftist Revolutionary Union"), or UNIR, as his own dissident political movement after breaking with the Liberal Party.
Political discourse
It is said that Gaitán's main political asset was his profound and vibrant oratoryOratory
Oratory is a type of public speaking.Oratory may also refer to:* Oratory , a power metal band* Oratory , a place of worship* a religious order such as** Oratory of Saint Philip Neri ** Oratory of Jesus...
, often classified as populist
Populism
Populism can be defined as an ideology, political philosophy, or type of discourse. Generally, a common theme compares "the people" against "the elite", and urges social and political system changes. It can also be defined as a rhetorical style employed by members of various political or social...
by contemporaries and by later analysts, which attracted hundreds of thousands of union members and low-income Colombians at the time. When he was a student in Rome he was influenced by Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
's techniques for mobilising the people. Bernstein considered that the promises that he made to the people were as important to his appeal as his impressive public speaking skills, promises that Bernstein felt made him almost a demagogue, and which led Bernstein to compare him with Juan Perón
Juan Perón
Juan Domingo Perón was an Argentine military officer, and politician. Perón was three times elected as President of Argentina though he only managed to serve one full term, after serving in several government positions, including the Secretary of Labor and the Vice Presidency...
of Argentina.
In particular, he repeatedly divided the country into the oligarchy
Oligarchy
Oligarchy is a form of power structure in which power effectively rests with an elite class distinguished by royalty, wealth, family ties, commercial, and/or military legitimacy...
and the people
Nation
A nation may refer to a community of people who share a common language, culture, ethnicity, descent, and/or history. In this definition, a nation has no physical borders. However, it can also refer to people who share a common territory and government irrespective of their ethnic make-up...
, calling the former corrupt and the latter admirable, worthy, and deserving of Colombia's moral restoration. He stirred the audience's emotions by aggressively denouncing social, moral and economical evils stemming both from the Liberal and Conservative political parties, promising his supporters that a better future was possible if they all worked together against such evils.
In 1946, Gaitán referred to the difference between what he called the "political country" and the "national country". Accordingly, the "political country" was controlled by the interests of the oligarchy and its internal struggles, therefore it did not properly respond to the real demands of the "national country"; that is, the country made up of citizens in need of better socioeconomic conditions and greater sociopolitical freedom.
He was criticized by the more orthodox sectors of the Colombian Liberal Party
Colombian Liberal Party
The Colombian Liberal Party is a center-left party in Colombia that adheres to social democracy and social liberalism.The Party was founded in 1848 and, together with the Colombian Conservative Party, subsequently became one of the two main political forces in the country for over a century.After...
(who considered him too unruly), most of the Colombian Conservative Party
Colombian Conservative Party
The Colombian Conservative Party , is a conservative political party in Colombia. The party was unofficially founded by a group of Revolutionary Commoners during the Revolutionary War for Independence from the Spanish Monarchy and later formally established during the Greater Colombia...
, the leadership of the Colombian Communist Party
Colombian Communist Party
The Colombian Communist Party or PCC is the legal communist party of Colombia. It was founded in 1930, as the Colombian section of the Comintern...
(who saw him as a competitor for the political affections of the masses). Gaitán was warned by U.S. Ambassador Beaulac on March 24, 1948 that Communists were planning a disruption of the impending conference and that his Liberal Party would likely be blamed.
Gaitán's view of the 'people' has been considered as profoundly ambivalent by some later analysts. It is argued that, while he claimed to champion their cause, he did not see them as a social or political force capable of governing. There are instances in which he referred to the masses in explicitly pathological terms (as 'syphilitics' and 'alcoholics'), while in others he praised their virtues. This ambivalence, according to some analysts, could partly explain the extreme acts of savagery perpetrated by the peasantry during La Violencia.
The subject of future land reform
Land reform
[Image:Jakarta farmers protest23.jpg|300px|thumb|right|Farmers protesting for Land Reform in Indonesia]Land reform involves the changing of laws, regulations or customs regarding land ownership. Land reform may consist of a government-initiated or government-backed property redistribution,...
was also prominent in some of his speeches.
Late political career
After formally rejoining the Liberal Party in 1935, he was selected as mayor of Bogotá in June 1936, a position he held for eight months. During his administration, he tried to implement a number of programs in areas such as education, health, urban development and housing. His attempted reforms were cut short by political pressure groups and conflicts due to some of his policies (for example, an attempt to provide uniforms to taxi and bus service drivers). In September 1937 his daughter Gloria Gaitán was born.Gaitán was named Minister of Education in 1940 under the administration of the Liberal Party's Eduardo Santos
Eduardo Santos
Eduardo Santos Montejo was a leading Colombian publisher and politician, active in the Colombian Liberal Party. He owned the prominent Bogotá newspaper El Tiempo, and served as the President of Colombia from August 1938 to August 1942.Santos was close friends with the Venezuelan Ambassador in...
(1938–1942), where he promoted an extensive literacy
Literacy
Literacy has traditionally been described as the ability to read for knowledge, write coherently and think critically about printed material.Literacy represents the lifelong, intellectual process of gaining meaning from print...
campaign as well as cultural activities.
At the conclusion of the Liberal Party's national convention in 1945 he was proclaimed as "the people's candidate" in a public square, an unusual setting under the political customs at the time.
The Liberal Party was defeated in the May 1946 elections by the Conservative's Mariano Ospina Pérez
Mariano Ospina Pérez
Luis Mariano Ospina Pérez was a Colombian engineer and political figure, member of the Colombian Conservative Party. He served as President of Colombia between 1946 and 1950.- Biographic data :...
(565,939 votes, president from 1946 to 1950) due to its own internal divisions, evidenced by its presenting two different candidates, Gaitán (358,957 votes) and Gabriel Turbay (441,199 votes), in that year's race.
Gaitán became leader of the Colombian Liberal Party in 1947, when his supporters gained the upper hand in the elections for seats in Congress
Congress of Colombia
The Congress of the Republic of Colombia is the name given to Colombia's bicameral national legislature.The Congress of Colombia consists of the 102-seat Senate , and the 166-seat Chamber of Representatives ...
. This would have allowed for the Liberal Party to present a single candidate for the 1950 elections.
An unclear crime of homicide
It is widely speculated that Gaitán would likely have been elected President had he not been assassinated on April 9, 1948. This assassination occurred immediately prior to the armed insurrection or BogotazoBogotazo
El Bogotazo refers to the massive riots that followed the assassination in Bogotá, Colombia of Liberal leader and presidential candidate Jorge Eliécer Gaitán on April 9, 1948 during the government of President Mariano Ospina Pérez...
. Dr. Gaitán was then the leading opponent for the use of violence and had determined to pursue the strategy of electing a left-wing government, and he had repudiated the violent Communist revolutionary approach typical of the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
era. His assassination directly lead to a period of great violence between conservatives and liberals and also facilitated the rise of the currently existing Communist guerrillas. Over the next fifteen years as many as 200,000 people died due to the disorders that followed his assassination.
Dr. Gaitán's alleged murderer, Juan Roa Sierra
Juan Roa Sierra
Juan Roa Sierra was a Colombian known for assassinating Colombian Liberal leader and presidential candidate Jorge Eliécer Gaitán on April 9, 1948. After he shot Gaitán three times, mortally wounding him, a mob chased him down and killed him...
, was killed by an enraged mob and his motivations were never known. Many different entities and individuals have been held responsible as the alleged plotters, including his different critics, but so far no definite information has come forward and a number of theories persist. Among them, there are versions which, sometimes conflictingly, implicate the government of Mariano Ospina Pérez
Mariano Ospina Pérez
Luis Mariano Ospina Pérez was a Colombian engineer and political figure, member of the Colombian Conservative Party. He served as President of Colombia between 1946 and 1950.- Biographic data :...
, sectors of the Liberal party, the USSR the Colombian Communist Party
Colombian Communist Party
The Colombian Communist Party or PCC is the legal communist party of Colombia. It was founded in 1930, as the Colombian section of the Comintern...
, the CIA and others in the crime.
One of the persons supporting the theory of some sort of CIA involvement in Gaitán's murder is Gloria Gaitán , who was 11 years old when her father was murdered. According to one version of this theory, Juan Roa Sierra acted under the orders of CIA agents John Mepples Espirito (alias Georgio Ricco) and Tomás Elliot, as part of an anti-leftist plan supposedly called Operation Pantomime
Operation Pantomime
Operation Pantomime , according to a documentary elaborated by the Cuban ICAIC, was an operation undertaken by the government of the United States with the intention of assassinating Colombian presidential candidate Jorge Eliécer Gaitán in 1948 as a way to curb communist and leftwing influence in...
. It is claimed that this would also have involved the complicity of the then Chief of Police, who would allegedly have ordered two police officers to abandon Juan Roa Sierra to be killed by the mob (a claim which conflicts with mainstream accounts of Roa Sierra's death). An eyewitness to the actual events, Guillermo Perez Sarmiento, Director of the United Press in Colombia, stated that upon his arrival Roa was already "between two policemen" and describes in detail the angry mob that kicked and "tore him to pieces" and does not suggest any police involvement.
Nathaniel Weyl documents the assassination claims then made by Rafael Azula Barrera and the President of Colombia Mariano Ospina Pérez
Mariano Ospina Pérez
Luis Mariano Ospina Pérez was a Colombian engineer and political figure, member of the Colombian Conservative Party. He served as President of Colombia between 1946 and 1950.- Biographic data :...
that Gaitán was assassinated as part of a Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
conspiracy led by the USSR to increase Soviet influence in the Caribbean. The violent disruption of the 1948 Inter-American Conference and the violent deaths of a thousand people was alleged to also have been part of a Cold War conspiracy by agents of the USSR that allegedly included the then low-level Soviet agent Fidel Castro
Fidel Castro
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz is a Cuban revolutionary and politician, having held the position of Prime Minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976, and then President from 1976 to 2008. He also served as the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from the party's foundation in 1961 until 2011...
. According to police records Fidel Castro
Fidel Castro
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz is a Cuban revolutionary and politician, having held the position of Prime Minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976, and then President from 1976 to 2008. He also served as the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from the party's foundation in 1961 until 2011...
was suspected of personally assassinating Gaitán, as his Cuban travelling companion, Rafael del Pino was seen with the fascist former mental patient, Juan Roa, an hour and a half before the assassination. Castro had attempted to recruit Gaitán earlier to his cause, but Gaitán had repeatedly declined and was assassinated because he was too politically influential and would have countered the Cold War objectives of the USSR in the Caribbean..
Another theory states that Juan Roa simply got tired and disenchanted of lobbying Jorge Eliécer Gaitán to get a job. He had a history of job instability and considered that he could get a position worthy of his status as a reincarnation of Santander and Quesada. He had an initial conversation with Jorge Eliécer and was advised to write a letter to the President, which he did, but still did not get a job. After that, he had visited Jorge Eliécer Gaitán's office several times in the two months prior to the assassination. The revolver was purchased two days before the assassination and the ammunition the day before. It was only on his last visit, on April 9, when the secretary finally wrote his name to be considered by Jorge Eliécer.
Nathaniel Weyl documents an alternative claim by the Colombian President and others, that Roa was influenced by others and perhaps did not commit any crime at all. He discusses the questions of Milton Bracker of the New York Times and U.S. Ambassador Willard L. Beaulac if Roa had acted on his own. Ambassador Beaulac then speculated that Roa was simply used to cover the identity of the real assassins. The President of Colombia Mariano Ospina Pérez
Mariano Ospina Pérez
Luis Mariano Ospina Pérez was a Colombian engineer and political figure, member of the Colombian Conservative Party. He served as President of Colombia between 1946 and 1950.- Biographic data :...
and the Colombian General Secretary Rafael Azula Barrera considered the evidence that the revolver Roa had carried was incapable of accurate fire, that Roa was not thought to have any firearms training, and that no eyewitness saw Roa anywhere near the assassination, that he was first seen between two policemen. From this evidence the government of Colombia concluded that the impoverished Roa with his diminished mental capacities had been paid to stand near the event with a recently fired revolver.
Pan-American Conference
The Conferences of American States, commonly referred to as the Pan-American Conferences, were meetings of the Pan-American Union, an international organization for cooperation on trade and other issues. They were first introduced by James G. Blaine of Maine in order to establish closer ties...
, which was being led by U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall
George Marshall
George Catlett Marshall was an American military leader, Chief of Staff of the Army, Secretary of State, and the third Secretary of Defense...
, a meeting which led to a pledge by members to fight communism
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
in the Americas
Americas
The Americas, or America , are lands in the Western hemisphere, also known as the New World. In English, the plural form the Americas is often used to refer to the landmasses of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions, while the singular form America is primarily...
, as well as the creation of the Organization of American States
Organization of American States
The Organization of American States is a regional international organization, headquartered in Washington, D.C., United States...
.
Another event in the country's capital Bogotá
Bogotá
Bogotá, Distrito Capital , from 1991 to 2000 called Santa Fé de Bogotá, is the capital, and largest city, of Colombia. It is also designated by the national constitution as the capital of the department of Cundinamarca, even though the city of Bogotá now comprises an independent Capital district...
was taking place at the time: a Latin American Youth Congress, organized to protest the Pan American conference. This meeting was organized by a young Fidel Castro
Fidel Castro
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz is a Cuban revolutionary and politician, having held the position of Prime Minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976, and then President from 1976 to 2008. He also served as the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from the party's foundation in 1961 until 2011...
, and was funded by Perón
Juan Perón
Juan Domingo Perón was an Argentine military officer, and politician. Perón was three times elected as President of Argentina though he only managed to serve one full term, after serving in several government positions, including the Secretary of Labor and the Vice Presidency...
. Castro had an appointment to meet Gaitán, whom he very much admired, later in the afternoon on the day of his murder, and had also met with Gaitán two days earlier. It appears that Gaitán was contemplating supporting this conference. Gaitán commanded large audiences when he spoke and was one of the most influential men in the country.
The assassination provoked a violent riot known as the Bogotazo
Bogotazo
El Bogotazo refers to the massive riots that followed the assassination in Bogotá, Colombia of Liberal leader and presidential candidate Jorge Eliécer Gaitán on April 9, 1948 during the government of President Mariano Ospina Pérez...
(loose translation: the sack of Bogotá, or shaking of Bogotá), and a further ten years of violence during which at least 300,000 people died (a period known as La Violencia
La Violencia
La Violencia is a period of civil conflict in the Colombian countryside between supporters of the Colombian Liberal Party and the Colombian Conservative Party, a conflict which took place roughly from 1948 to 1958 ....
). Some writers say that this event influenced Castro's views about the viability of an electoral route for political change.
Also in the city that day was another young man who would become a giant of 20th century Latin-American history: Colombian writer and Nobel Prize Laureate Gabriel García Márquez
Gabriel García Márquez
Gabriel José de la Concordia García Márquez is a Colombian novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter and journalist, known affectionately as Gabo throughout Latin America. He is considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in...
. A young law student and short story writer at the time, García Márquez was eating lunch near the scene of the assassination. He arrived on the scene shortly after the shooting and witnessed the murder of Gaitán's presumed assassin at the hands of enraged bystanders. García Márquez discusses this day at vivid length in the first volume of his memoirs, Living to Tell the Tale
Living to Tell the Tale
Living to Tell the Tale is the first volume of the autobiography of Gabriel García Márquez....
. In his book, he describes a well-dressed man who eggs on the mob before fleeing in a luxurious car that arrived just as the presumed assassin was being dragged away.
Legacy: Gaitán as a popular myth
A popular story, perhaps apocryphal, relates that during a debate with the Conservative candidate for president, Gaitán asked him how he made his living.
"From the land", the other candidate replied.
"Ah, and how did you get this land?" asked Gaitán.
"I inherited it from my father!"
"And where did he get it from?"
"He inherited it from his father!"
The question is repeated once or twice more, and then the Conservative candidate concedes, "We took it from the Natives".
Gaitán's reply was, "Well, we want to do the opposite: we want to give the land back to the Natives". (Gaitán advocated land reform
Land reform
[Image:Jakarta farmers protest23.jpg|300px|thumb|right|Farmers protesting for Land Reform in Indonesia]Land reform involves the changing of laws, regulations or customs regarding land ownership. Land reform may consist of a government-initiated or government-backed property redistribution,...
).
See also
- Jorge Eliecer Gaitan MuseumJorge Eliecer Gaitan Museum- History :The house Jorge Eliécer Gaitán Ayala lived in from the beginning of the 1930s until the day of his murder on April 9, 1948, is located on Calle 42 No. 15 , 52 of the Santa Teresita neighborhood in Bogotá. It was also part of the design planned in 1928 for this area by the “Davila Holguin...
- Communism in ColombiaCommunism in ColombiaThe history of communism in Colombia goes back as far as the 1920s and has its roots in the idealism of the Russian October Revolution. Today the guerrilla groups, self-proclaimed as communists, state that they want to seize state power in Colombia by violent means, and the organizations such as...
- Colombian Liberal PartyColombian Liberal PartyThe Colombian Liberal Party is a center-left party in Colombia that adheres to social democracy and social liberalism.The Party was founded in 1848 and, together with the Colombian Conservative Party, subsequently became one of the two main political forces in the country for over a century.After...
- Colombian Conservative PartyColombian Conservative PartyThe Colombian Conservative Party , is a conservative political party in Colombia. The party was unofficially founded by a group of Revolutionary Commoners during the Revolutionary War for Independence from the Spanish Monarchy and later formally established during the Greater Colombia...
- Colombian Communist PartyColombian Communist PartyThe Colombian Communist Party or PCC is the legal communist party of Colombia. It was founded in 1930, as the Colombian section of the Comintern...
- Revolutionary Armed Forces of ColombiaRevolutionary Armed Forces of ColombiaThe Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army is a Marxist–Leninist revolutionary guerrilla organization based in Colombia which is involved in the ongoing Colombian armed conflict, currently involved in drug dealing and crimes against the civilians..FARC-EP is a peasant army which...
- Military History of the FARC-EPMilitary History of the FARC-EPThe Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia is a Marxist-Leninist revolutionary guerrilla organization based in Colombia, which is involved in the ongoing Colombian armed conflict....