EDITORIAL : WALK THE TALK LIKE THE WORLD’S POOREST PRESIDENT

[Judi Lynn]

EDITORIAL : WALK THE TALK LIKE THE WORLD’S POOREST PRESIDENT
2015-03-06 00:41:29

In an era when President Maithripala Sirisena is setting an unprecedented example in servant leadership with a simple and humble lifestyle or alpechchathavaya, Sri Lankans who often prefer models from developed countries would do well to learn from what happened in the small South American State of Uruguay during the past five years.

The 79-year-old Jose Mujica was the President of Uruguay from 2010 to this year. A former urban guerrilla fighter with the Tupamaros and a member of the Broad Front coalition of socialist parties, Mr. Mujica was Minister of Livestock, Agriculture and Fisheries from 2005 to 2008 and a Senator after that.As the candidate of the Broad Front, he won the 2009 presidential election and took office as President on March 1, 2010. He has been described as the world’s humblest and poorest president, due to his austere lifestyle and his donation of around 90 per cent of his $12,000 monthly salary to charities that benefit poor people and small entrepreneurs.

As in the case of President Sirisena, Mr. Mujica’s father was a small-time farmer who went bankrupt shortly before his death in 1940, when his son was five. His mother’s parents were poor immigrants from Liguria in Italy. According to the BBC, Jose Mujica is often referred to as the president most other countries would rather have.Whatever a person’s particular shade of politics it is difficult not to be impressed by Mr. Mujica. There are idealistic, hard-working and honest politicians the world over, though cynics might argue they are a small minority, but none of them surely comes anywhere close to Mr. Mujica in terms of living by one’s principles.

It is not just for show. Mr. Mujica’s beat-up old VW Beetle is probably one of the most famous cars in the world and his decision to forgo the luxury of the Presidential Palace is not unique -- his successor, Tabare Vasquez, will also probably decide to live at home, BBC says. But when people visit Mr. Mujica at his one-storey home on the outskirts of Montevideo, they realize that the man is as good as his word.

More:
http://www.dailymirror.lk/65571/editorial-walk-the-talk-like-the-world-s-poorest-president#sthash.FXZvXU2m.dpuf

[alcina]

1. If only there were more like Mujica

“All I do is live like the majority of my people, not the minority. I’m living a normal life and Italian, Spanish leaders should also live as their people do. They should not be aspiring to or copying a rich minority,” he said.

Thank you, Judy Lynn, for posting these articles.

[Judi Lynn]

2. I hope there will be more men, women, who will take his story to heart, and use it as a foundation.

All his struggle, and his wife's, have not gone for nothing. They have helped to make their country better for people, and they are respected there.

We both know our own fascists are afraid of people like them, but fascists won't matter in the better world to come.

Thank you for your comment, alcina.