Paulo Afonso Aguena, known as “Catatau”, or even just “Cata”, as all his comrades called him, died yesterday at the age of 60. Catatau was fighting an extremely aggressive liver cancer. He fought bravely, as he did all his life, and yesterday he rested.
From a family of Japanese origin in the countryside of São Paulo, Catatau joined the students movement when he entered the Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar), still in the early 1980s. He got to know the Convergência Socialista [Socialist Convergence], of which he quickly became one of the main leaders. He was active in the students movement as well as in the labor movement, in addition to having lived in Argentina in the 2000s, where he had an important experience of international militancy. As a construction worker, he was persecuted by the dictatorship, for which he was recognized as a political amnesty by the Amnesty Commission. In 2016, along with other comrades, Catatau left PSTU and started to build MAIS (Movement for an Independent and Socialist Alternative), whose merger with NOS (New Socialist Organization) would later give rise to Resistência [Resistance], internal current of PSOL.
Discreet but cheerful, a scholar obsessed with the details of the political struggle, Catatau was one of the most beloved leaders of his generation, knowing like no one else how to connect with militants from the most varied social backgrounds and ages.
Catatau leaves two children and a partner. He also leaves a huge legacy of dedication, seriousness and boldness in politics and in the tasks of party building. And above all, he will be greatly missed.
The funeral will be held today (12/06) from 12:00 to 16:00 at the São Paulo Subway Workers Union: Rua Serra de Japi, 31. Tatuapé
National Coordination of Resistance-PSOL
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