María Elena Moyano
Encyclopedia
Peru
Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....
vian community organizer and activist of Afro-Peruvian
Afro-Peruvian
Afro Peruvians are citizens of Peru mostly descended from African slaves who were brought to the Western hemisphere with the arrival of the conquistadors towards the end of the slave trade.-Early history:...
descent who was assassinated by the maoist
Maoism
Maoism, also known as the Mao Zedong Thought , is claimed by Maoists as an anti-Revisionist form of Marxist communist theory, derived from the teachings of the Chinese political leader Mao Zedong . Developed during the 1950s and 1960s, it was widely applied as the political and military guiding...
Shining Path
Shining Path
Shining Path is a Maoist guerrilla terrorist organization in Peru. The group never refers to itself as "Shining Path", and as several other Peruvian groups, prefers to be called the "Communist Party of Peru" or "PCP-SL" in short...
(Sendero Luminoso) insurgent movement. Although only one of many atrocities committed during the most violent period of Peru's modern history, her death resulted in a public outcry.
Early life
Moyano was born in the BarrancoBarranco
Barranco is one of 43 districts in Lima, Peru. Its current mayor is Jessica Vargas and its postal code is 04.The district is considered to be the city's most romantic and bohemian, being the home and working place of many of Peru's leading artists, musicians, designers and photographers...
district of Lima
Lima
Lima is the capital and the largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín rivers, in the central part of the country, on a desert coast overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Together with the seaport of Callao, it forms a contiguous urban area known as the Lima...
. Her activism began in her teens, as a member of the Movimiento de Jóvenes Pobladores, a youth movement in Villa El Salvador
Villa El Salvador
Villa El Salvador is an urban, largely residential district on the outskirts of Lima, Peru. It borders the district of Chorrillos on the east; the Pacific Ocean on the southwest; Lurín on the southeast; Villa María del Triunfo on the east and San Juan de Miraflores on the north.- History :It began...
, a vast shantytown
Shanty town
A shanty town is a slum settlement of impoverished people who live in improvised dwellings made from scrap materials: often plywood, corrugated metal and sheets of plastic...
(pueblo joven
Pueblos jóvenes
Pueblos jóvenes is the nickname given to the vast shanty towns that surround Lima and other cities of Peru. Many of these towns have developed into significant districts in Lima such as Villa El Salvador and Comas.- Population :...
) on the outskirts of the capital, largely populated by migrants from the interior of the country.
In 1984, at age 24, she was elected president of the Federación Popular de Mujeres de Villa El Salvador (Fepomuves), a federation of women from Villa El Salvador
Villa El Salvador
Villa El Salvador is an urban, largely residential district on the outskirts of Lima, Peru. It borders the district of Chorrillos on the east; the Pacific Ocean on the southwest; Lurín on the southeast; Villa María del Triunfo on the east and San Juan de Miraflores on the north.- History :It began...
. Under her leadership, it grew to encompass public kitchens, health committees, the Vaso de Leche program (which supplied children with milk), income-generating projects, and committees for basic education. In 1990, Moyano left her position in Fepomuves and shortly thereafter was elected deputy mayor of the municipality of Villa El Salvador.
Shining Path inside Lima
At this time, Shining Path was trying to consolidate its hold on the poorer neighborhoods of Lima, and the circumstances obliged local political leaders to not make a firm commitment towards the grassroots organizations but to also take a principled stand on and pronounce a clear condemnation of terrorist methods.Shining Path was particularly suspicious of women's organizations, which it accused of reformism
Reformism
Reformism is the belief that gradual democratic changes in a society can ultimately change a society's fundamental economic relations and political structures...
, of collaboration with the government, and of opportunism; in short, of betraying the revolution as envisaged by Abimael Guzmán
Abimael Guzmán
Manuel Rubén Abimael Guzmán Reynoso , also known by the nom de guerre Presidente Gonzalo , a former professor of philosophy, was the leader of the Shining Path during the Maoist insurgency known as the internal conflict in Peru...
and the other leaders of the organization.
In mid-1991, Shining Path began an open attack on popular women leaders in Lima. In September, Juana López, coordinator of the Vaso de Leche program in the Carmen de la Legua Reynoso
Carmen de la Legua Reynoso
Carmen de la Legua Reynoso is a district of the Constitutional Province of Callao in Peru, and one of the six districts that comprise the port city of Callao....
district of Callao
Callao
Callao is the largest and most important port in Peru. The city is coterminous with the Constitutional Province of Callao, the only province of the Callao Region. Callao is located west of Lima, the country's capital, and is part of the Lima Metropolitan Area, a large metropolis that holds almost...
, was murdered after she had denounced the presence and activity of Sendero in the neighborhood. Protestors took to the streets to denounce and repudiate the methods of Sendero. Moyano was a speaker at the final gathering, strongly condemning what she considerated the terrorist activities of Sendero as threatening the very existence of the country.
Death
Shining Path, however, eventually caught up with Moyano. On February 15, 1992, during a fund-raising rally in Villa El Salvador, in the presence of her two children and other onlookers, she was machine-gunned to death and her corpse blown up with dynamite.Thousands of people attended her funeral. Later, in a plaza in the center of Villa El Salvador, a statue honoring Moyano was erected, and her autobiography was published.
The assassination of Moyano was one of the last major atrocities carried out by Shining Path. In September 1992, Guzmán was arrested and the leadership of the organization fell shortly thereafter. Subsequently, Shining Path was largely eradicated.