[Marxism] Filiberto Ojeda Ríos (London Economist Obituary )

["Walter Lippmann" <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

While the London Economist obviously opposed everything which
Ojeda Rios stood for, this is the first detailed comment I've
seen on him from the other side of the political spectrum and
it's a surprisingly respectful one. You can see a portrait of
the martyred Puertoc Rican independence fighter as well at the
London Economist website.

More radio interviews on Pacifica's Democracy NOW!
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/26/1434229
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/29/1348227 )
===============================================================

Obituary

Filiberto Ojeda Ríos
Sep 29th 2005
>From The Economist print edition


http://www.economist.com/PrinterFriendly.cfm?story_id=4455267

Filiberto Ojeda Ríos, Puerto Rican revolutionary, died on September
23rd, aged 72

PUERTO RICO is a not-quite-this, not-quite-that sort of place: a part
of the United States but culturally and linguistically very Spanish,
politically American but technically a ?commonwealth?, not a state,
whose people pay no federal taxes and have no vote in presidential
elections. For some, this is a satisfactory equilibrium; for others,
a half-way house on the way to statehood. For Filiberto Ojeda Ríos,
it was a form of purgatory, an unwelcome condition between the hell
of Spanish colonialism and the relatively celestial end-point of
independence. But since independence was awkwardly neither desired by
most Puerto Ricans nor offered by the other citizens of the United
States, he would fight for it and, if need be, die for it. This he
did, in a shoot-out with the FBI at a farmhouse in western Puerto
Rico last Friday.

The incident made little impact in most of the country. Even in New
York, which is home to over 1m people of Puerto Rican descent, it was
reported only cursorily in the mainstream newspapers. The killing was
noticed, though, in Hartford, Connecticut, and extensively covered by
the Hartford Courant. No wonder: it was in West Hartford that Mr
Ojeda Ríos had carried out his most notorious criminal act in the
mainland United States, a raid upon a Wells Fargo depot in 1983 in
which $7.2m was stolen. Only $80,000 was recovered. The rest was
either spirited away to Mexico and thence Cuba to finance the
struggle for Puerto Rican independence or, in a grand revolutionary
gesture, scattered from the tops of tall buildings to protest against
the ?greed-infested men and mechanisms? exploiting ordinary
Americans.

The raid was not all Mr Ojeda Ríos's work: he had acted with 18
members of the Macheteros (machete-wielders, or cane-cutters), an
outfit he had formed in 1976. More formally known as the Boricua
People's Army, they were an underground paramilitary group dedicated
to freeing Puerto Rico from American ?colonial? rule. Although they
are said to have cells throughout the United States and even in other
countries?the links with Cuba are supposedly strong?the Macheteros
have never been numerous. Their number these days is put at about
1,100.

Arrested in due course, Mr Ojeda Ríos was charged not just with
involvement in the Hartford robbery but also with a rocket attack a
few weeks later on a federal court in San Juan, Puerto Rico's
capital. But strangely?for he had shot and wounded a policeman during
his arrest, and was also implicated in the Macheteros' blowing-up of
11 aircraft at a National Guard base in Puerto Rico in 1981?he was
constrained only by an electronic tag. This he cut off, and
disappeared, becoming one of the FBI's ?most wanted fugitives?. Two
years later, in 1992, he was sentenced in absentia to 55 years in
prison.

Most Puerto Ricans had no liking for the methods employed by the
Macheteros. Yet it was hard to dislike their leader. Unusually
bright, Mr Ojeda Ríos had gone to university at the age of 15 and
always showed an engaging intelligence. Former comrades who later
gave up the struggle never lost their respect for him, and even FBI
interrogators had a grudging admiration. Latterly he showed a
single-minded dedication to his cause, yet he had other interests,
notably music. His revolutionary career had been preceded by a stint
in a well-known salsa band, for which he played both the guitar and
the trumpet.

Perhaps all this helps to explain why the news of his death has been
greeted more with sadness than anything else. There has certainly
been no public rejoicing. Several hundred people gathered at a rally
in Manhattan on September 26th, and a wake was planned in the barrio
there later in the week. More significantly, in Puerto Rico itself
questions have been asked about the circumstances of Mr Ojeda Ríos's
death, and not just by his supporters. Governor Aníbal Acevedo Vilá,
for instance, has described the FBI's actions as improper and highly
irregular, asking why his government was not informed. Questions have
also been asked by politicians across the spectrum about the time
taken?the best part of a day?to fetch Mr Ojeda Ríos's body from the
farmhouse after he had been shot. An autopsy has revealed that he did
not die at once.

There is disquiet, too, about the timing of the shooting. It took
place on the day of El Grito de Lares, the annual commemoration of
the events of September 23rd 1868, when a group of Puerto Ricans rose
up in protest against Spanish rule. It has become a date of great
significance to the independence movement, and on it Mr Ojeda Ríos
would sometimes, from a safe house, give interviews to Puerto Rican
journalists.

In a second-class state

Yet if all this emotion owes something to the reluctant affection
that some Puerto Ricans had for Mr Ojeda Ríos, it probably owes much
more to the ambivalent sentiments widely held about his cause.
Sympathy for violence there is not. But sympathy for a romantic who
would fight for his little island and its 3.9m often-overlooked
people, that is another matter. Like the Irish, an island nation of
similar size, with a diaspora to match, Puerto Ricans often feel
slighted by their big neighbour. Mr Ojeda Ríos drew on that sense of
grievance, even though most of his countrymen were far too sensible
to follow him.



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