Argentines yearn for Evita 70 years after her death

María Eva Noble says she continues the legacy of her namesake while working at a soup kitchen in a working-class neighborhood in Buenos Aires.

It was baptized with the name of the iconic former Argentine first lady María Eva Duarte de Perón, better known as Eva Perón or Evita, whose death marked the 70th anniversary on Tuesday. The soup kitchen Noble volunteers at in the Flores neighborhood serves about 200 people daily and is run by an organization that also bears the late leader’s name.

Although she is not related by blood to Eva Perón, Noble says she is “in my DNA.” And she’s not the only one who feels this way.

Seven decades after her death, Evita continues to arouse passions in Argentina as her followers believe her image as a defender of the most disadvantaged is more relevant than ever at a time when inequality and poverty are on the rise, while the economy remains stagnant. amid runaway inflation.

Evita has starred in countless books, movies, television series and even a Broadway musical, but for some of her oldest and most ardent fans, the connection to the actress-turned-political leader is much more personal.

Juana Marta Barro was one of the dozens of people who lined up on Tuesday morning to bring flowers and pay their respects at Evita’s tomb, in the cemetery of the Recoleta neighborhood of the Argentine capital.

With tears in her eyes, Barro, 84, the daughter of a housewife, recalled how her life in the province of Tucumán, in the north of the country, improved after Evita entered the political scene, and suddenly received better shoes and a school uniform.

“She introduced me to the backpack,” said Barro, who still remembers the emotion of seeing Evita pass through her town on a train. “It’s a torch burning in my heart.”

Evita was born into a humble home in Los Toldos, a small rural town about 300 kilometers (186 miles) from the capital, where she moved when she was 15 years old to pursue her dream of becoming an actress. A decade later, she met Juan Domingo Perón, a military man who was a government official.

Evita stood by him when Perón won the presidential election in 1946 and went on to play an unprecedented role as a powerful first lady. She became a champion for women’s rights causes, such as suffrage, which passed a year later, and she laid the foundation for a foundation to help workers and the poor.

But although she was much loved, she was equally hated by many of the country’s rich and powerful, who distrusted her growing popularity and influence.

His stage in the spotlight was intense but short, as he died of cervical cancer at the age of 33, which caused a wave of pain in the streets while the country dressed in mourning.

Perón was elected president twice more and was the founder of a political movement, Peronism, which has dominated Argentine political life to this day, with many leaders of disparate ideologies proclaiming their allegiance to the former general.

“Perón was respected, he was obeyed, one agreed with what he said or not. But Evita was loved or hated, which brought a strong emotional adherence to Peronism,” said Felipe Pigna, a historian who has written extensively about the former first lady.

For some, that emotion lingers.

On the eve of the anniversary of Evita’s death, María Eva Sapire and almost 100 other people dressed as her to participate in a tribute.

Sapire owes her name to Evita and now she talks about her with her daughter.

“When you listen to his speeches, it’s amazing how everything fits together like it does now, so many years later,” Sapire said.

Others who began to admire Evita later often say that it was precisely the feeling that she was ahead of her time in many respects, especially regarding women’s rights, that made them join her legions of followers.

“Youth sectors capture in Evita a rebel, a figure who did not give up, who did not give up”, and ended up dying “beautiful and young”, which contributed to the construction of a “pop icon”, said Pigna.

“Eva is a character that casts a spell,” said Alejandro Maci, director of the new series “Santa Evita” that premiered Tuesday on Disney’s streaming platform and is based on a 1995 novel by Argentine writer Tomás Eloy Martínez.

Perón and Evita continue to be the object of criticism both in Argentina and abroad. Some, for example, say that Evita used state funds to carry out what she described as charitable work to build an image of saintliness and help increase the popularity of her husband. Others point out that the couple received money from the Nazis to help war crimes perpetrators hide in Argentina after World War II.

Cristina Álvarez Rodríguez, a great-niece of Evita who serves as a minister in the provincial government of Buenos Aires, stated that she is especially moved by the number of “very young girls who tattooed Evita on their skin” and now “have her like a lighthouse”.

Many also yearn for a figure like that of Evita now.

For some, the current government of President Alberto Fernández, who defines himself as a Peronist, has moved away from those principles.

“The Argentine people feel betrayed, Peronism never came to starve the people and now the people are starving,” said Mateo Nieto, who has photos of Perón and Evita in his pizzeria in the northern city of Posadas, near the border. with Paraguay.

Nieto said that “the government that is calling itself Peronist, but in the fruits it is not Peronism.”

“The truth is that someone like Evita is missed. It would be nice to have a leader like her right now,” she added.

Maci considers that Evita is an “interesting metaphor” to think about the type of country that Argentines want at a time of growing poverty and inequality.

“What this woman proposed is a society with greater mobility, which is what today’s Argentina does not have, which lacks social mobility and if it does, it is downwards,” he said.

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