Fernando Nadra (June 29, 1916 – August 22, 1995) was an Argentine lawyer, journalist and public speaker. He was one of the most important leaders of the Partido Comunista Argentino (Argentine Communist Party) and, from his Marxist ideological perspective, took part in most of the important political debates of his time. He stood out from other left-wing leaders of his time for his abilities as an organizer and collective activist, and his numerous attempts to promote agreement among different political sectors through pluralistic dialogue.
As many of his contemporaries, he experienced persecutions, prison and censure.
Childhood and youth
Nadra was born to Syrian immigrants, who arrived in San Miguel de Tucumán at the beginning of the 20th century. His mother, Nabiha Louis, was a teacher in her native town, Damascus. His father, Nallib Nadra, a native of Homs, amassed an important fortune in Argentina. Though he started out as a modest trader, he went on to become the first agent of FIAT in the northwest and, later, he devoted himself to the sugar industry.
From his adolescence Fernando Nadra stood out in the social and cultural life of his province. In 1938, at the age of 22, he published his first book of poems “Visión de Cumbre” (Summit View). One of those poems was analyzed in the Argentine volume of a British 19-volume book about the impact of the Spanish Civil War on intellectuals from Hispanic–American countries.
Later, in 1943, Nadra was one of the founders of the poetic and cultural Movement of the Argentine Northwest, with headquarters in Tucumán's La Carpa (The Tent). This movement included personalities like Raúl Galán, Manuel J. Castilla, Raúl Aráoz Anzoátegui, María Adela Agudo, Nicandro Pereyra, Julio Ardiles Gray o José Fernández Molina).
Student leader Nadra first became involved in politics at the age of 14, as the leader of a take-over at Colegio Nacional Mitre (Mitre National School) in the city of Tucumán, after which he was violently arrested by the local police. Soon after, he was appointed president of Federación de Estudiantes Secundarios de Tucumán (High School Students' Federation of Tucumán).
He studied Law at Universidad Nacional de Córdoba (National University of Cordoba) where he was chosen Secretary of the Students' Centre and, eventually, President of the Federación Universitaria de Córdoba (University Federation of Cordoba). In June 1942, in this role, he delivered a eulogy for his advisor and friend Deodoro Roca, the most important figure of the Reforma Universitaria de 1918 (Argentine University Reform of 1918).
Between 1937 and 1939, he was President of the Federación Universitaria Argentina (Argentine University Federation) and had a crucial role as speaker for the antifascist positions in the III National Congress of Students called by FUA Córdoba in October, 1942.
In 1941, Nazi Germany demanded Ramón S. Castillo's federal intervention of Córdoba and Nadra's detention because –while leading the massive protest on Argentina's Flag Day– Nadra had demanded that the Nazi flag should be replaced by the Argentine flag. The demand was rejected by the police force at the place. The local newspaper "Córdoba" depicted Nadra's reaction as follows; "...the young student, who had climbed and reached one of the ends of the Nazi flag, hung it up himself and without losing it, jumped into the sidewalk. The weight of his body broke the flagpole of the flag and everything dropped to the ground, where the protesters picked it up and readily destroyed it ... "
Personal and professional life, and affiliation to the Communist Party
Fernando Nadra joined the PC in 1939. Even though this decision was questioned by his family, Nadra's commitment did not waver and eventually led him to donate his personal fortune to the PC. His assets came to be handled by what was known as Board of Directors, a secret group within the PC which managed a complex network of companies including laboratories, media and the Coca-Cola Bottling Factory in Argentina.
In 1945, after being imprisoned several times and suspended for two years at the National University of Córdoba, Nadra studied on his own and took the required exams to graduate from Law School. For the next six years, he worked as a lawyer and he also joined the Tucumán Province PC, where he worked as Secretary of Education and Propaganda.
In the elections of February 1946, he was nominated as candidate to National Representative Parliament by Democratic Union, a position he lost by a hundred votes. After the triumph of Peronism, when PC called its XI Congress in Buenos Aires, Nadra attended as a delegate.
In 1946 he also married Zulma Beltramone, from Cordoba Province and began living in Buenos Aires, where he worked as a member of the Capital Federal's PC; during most of Peron's government, he was driven underground while hounded by police forces.
Support of the Cuban Revolution
In April 1960, 13 months after the Cuban Revolution and a year before Fidel Castro proclaimed himself as a socialist, Nadra led the Argentine Delegation of “The First Latin America Meeting of Solidarity with Cuba” in La Habana. John W. Cooke, and Lisandro Viale were also part of this delegation. Together with Salvador Allende and David Alfaro Siqueiros, Nadra wrote the meeting's record, and he also met two times with Ernesto "Che" Guevara.
When he came back to Argentina, Nadra published a leaflet "Cuba, fragua revolucionaria" (“Cuba, Revolutionary Forge”). His defense of Cuba's process was met by resistance on part of the Argentine PC, which opposed the continental strategy of Cuba.
On July 20, 1960, Nadra took part in a roundtable about the Cuban Revolution, at University of Buenos Aires' School of Law, together with Silvio Frondizi, Miguel Ángel Asturias, Alexis Lattendorf and Lisandro Viale. At the end of that meeting, he was arrested by the police and imprisoned at Las Heras Prison. Nadra was then transferred to Caseros Prison, where he shared a cell and built up a friendship with Peronist union leaders Sebastián Borro and Andrés Framini. Nadra spent around two years in different Argentine prisons, some of them in the Southern provinces, where the poor conditions seriously deteriorated his health.
During Nadra's imprisonment, several relatives of political prisoners –including his wife– created the Committee of Relatives of Political and Trade Union Prisoners (COFADE) in order to provide a supportive and legal assistance to prisoners arrested by the State Plan against Internal Disturbances (CONINTES), mainly Peronists and communists.
In an interview between Nadra's wife and former President Arturo Frondizi, who had been friends with Nadra in their youth, the President told her: "I can not do anything. He is a political prisoner of the US Embassy and the CIA. I was told that he was sent by Fidel and Guevara to organize the guerrilla in our country”.
Dialogue between Catholics and Marxists
On October 18, 1965, Nadra, the priest Carlos Mugica and other Communist political leaders and priests held a debate to promote dialogue between Catholics and Marxists (with the name of Dialogue Between Catholics and Marxists), at the Aula Magna of the School of Philosophy and Languages of University of Buenos Aires. The speakers recognized the common ground in principles of both Marxism and Christianity, especially, criticism to the impact of capitalism on the poor. They also agreed to work together to “…end the impoverishment of human life, misery, overexploitation and the lack of basic democratic freedom for everybody [and to] create […] a new form of government which is authentically democratic and for the people".
The “Argentine Revolution” Dictatorship
During the military government that took power between 1966 and 1973, Nadra was the PC's Secretary of National Propaganda. As the military government had banned political parties and passed Law 17401 especially against communist activity, once again, Nadra was persecuted and had to live in hiding. However, also during this time, he supervised the PC's campaign of political agitation through commandos and mass movements.
Héctor Cámpora's triumph and Support of Perón's candidature Between 1970 and 1973, from his position in the PC, Nadra opposed La Hora del Pueblo, an alliance among traditional parties in Argentine politics to strike a deal with General Lieutenant Alejandro Agustín Lanusse and call for presidential elections. Nadra supported an alternative alliance, The Argentine National Meeting for Democratic Freedoms and Human Rights (ENA), managed by representatives of several political parties, trade unions and social organizations. The ENA also advocated for elections and the enforcement of human and democratic rights, but without excluding parties or political leaders, a concession La Hora del Pueblo was unwilling to make.
When the "de facto" government decided “ a conditioned electoral solution”, without Peron's involvement and the proscription of the PC, Nadra promoted the creation of a front including both the PC and Peronism. However, the Peronist Party was not willing to include Communists in any of the two fronts it created along with other political parties: Frente Cívico de Liberación Nacional (FRECILINA) and Frente Justicialista de Liberación (FREJULI), with which it finally would run for the Elections of 1973.
In this situation, Nadra supported an alliance between the PC, the Partido Intransigente (PI), The Christian Revolutionary Party and Unión del Pueblo Argentino (Udelpa) in Alianza Popular Revolucionaria/APR (Popular Revolutionary Alliance). The alliance's presidential formula for the 1973 elections (Oscar Alende-Horacio Sueldo) had almost a million votes, securing dozens of national and provincial representatives, as well as city councillors.
That year, Nadra was appointed Director of Nuestra Palabra, the PC Central Committee's newspaper. Until March 24, 1976, when the military government banned the newspaper (its headquarters were shot by para-police forces), Nadra's articles analyzed the most important events of Argentine political life.
After Cámpora's resignation on July 13, 1973, Nadra was spokesman for the PC's support of Juan Perón for the upcoming presidential elections. After Perón's triumph, Nadra met various times with the President, both bilaterally and with other leaders of the PC or of parties with parliamentary representation ( PST, PI and UCR, among others that conformed the Group of 8 “Grupo de los 8”). Nadra understood these meetings –which he did not have with the next Peronist president– as an opportunity to express concerns, criticisms and proposals, and eventually build a political consensus to work on Argentina's most pressing economic and social problems.
Between 1974 and 1976, Nadra was frequently threatened by the Argentine Anticommunist Alliance, which was supported by part of the Peronist Government; he was also usually criticized by the magazine El Caudillo.
Civic- Military Dictatorship 1976-1983
With a heightening the economic and political crisis during Isabel Perón's presidency and the rise to power of several dictatorships in South America, Nadra warned about the possibility of a new military coup in Argentina, about “a bloodbath, like in Chile, and the danger of a civil war and the rise of a dictatorship very much like the ones already existing in five countries which surround us" (A policy against people and Nation. Are the painful experiences of 1930, 1943, 1955 and 1966 not enough?).