After a long and eventful life, Amancio Cabrero Ledesma (1936-2023) has left us. Many will remember him after his rotund mustache and dark glasses, giving a face to the electoral poster of the Madrid Workers’ Candidacy that was distributed by thousands throughout the streets and towns of the Community. It was the name that the Revolutionary Organization of Workers (ORT) had to adopt in order to run in the 1977 general elections, as it had not been legalized by the Government of Adolfo Suárez.
Amancio was the creator, with other colleagues, of the Workers’ Union Alternative (AST) in 1963, a union organization that agreed to participate in the nascent CCOO. Amancio had started his work at the National Optical Company (ENOSA). Years later he will continue his work at the FAGOR company.
In 1970, under the dictatorship, Amancio promoted the ORT. He is the visible head of him, clandestinity prevents other colleagues from being public figures for security reasons. This delegated role forces him to go into exile, to Bayonne (France) with his wife and his two children, missing the last years of Franco’s rule in person. His activity in this period of clandestinity is aimed at building a support structure for the organization and strengthening relations abroad with other related parties.
After his return to Spain in 1976 and after an official visit to the People’s Republic of China, invited by the Communist Party of China, he was appointed to represent the ORT before the unitary organizations of the opposition to Francoism, actively mediating for the union of the two opposition platforms: Democratic Junta and Platform of Democratic Organizations, coming together in the so-called Platajunta.
Without having achieved legalization as a political party, the poster with his face flooded the streets, the fences, the facades representing the Workers’ Candidacy.
In 1978 he worked hard in a broad campaign to support the Yes to the Constitution in stands and public events throughout Spain.
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In 1979, the possibility of merging with the Spanish Labor Party (PTE) of Eladio García Castro arose and Amancio appeared in all the negotiations to formalize the union between both parties, which ultimately turned out to be a failure.
In 1980 the Assembly will be held to ratify the dissolution of the ORT, Amancio stands up until the end. His years of effort have been frustrated by the new political situation.
Amancio returns to Fagor, the appliance cooperative that this time will be entrusted to him by the Madrid Sales Delegation. With the new directions of politics, he is appointed manager of the Development Agency of the Community of Madrid. Years later he will be appointed deputy director of the Madrid Development Institute (IMADE), a position he will occupy until the victory of Alberto Ruiz Gallardón.
He was a member of the PSOE from 1993 until 2000, the year in which he left the party because he felt disappointed by the policies developed by José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. [secretario general de la formación desde el 2000 al 2012]. On 15-M he will renew his hope and decides to join Podemos, a group to which he has belonged until his death.
Amancio, with a life history of 87 years, dares to express his “I confess that I have fought.” His life has been a story dedicated to political struggle. A struggle without personal results, beyond the satisfaction of having been consistent throughout the process, of having responded to all the demands that were presented at each political moment, of having shared experiences and experiences with thousands of women and men committed to the same democratic adventure.
Amancio has been a consistent, brave man dedicated to the democratic cause, with impeccable morality and bombproof optimism.
Francisca Sauquillo She is a lawyer, activist, politician. She prefaced the book ‘Amancio Cabrero: live, fight, dream’, about the career of the ORT leader.
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