Francisco Igartua

Francisco Igartua Rovira, better known as Paco Igartua (September 5, 1923 – March 24, 2004) was a Basque-Peruvian district outside Lima to Francisco Igartua and Herminia Rovira, he went to school in Callao, and studied at the Franciscan seminary in Santiago de Chile for a year. alongside Doris Gibson, he founded the magazine Caretas, which he directed from October 3, 1950, to October 22, 1962. The magazine is still relevant today. In 1952, the Odría dictatorship exiled him to Panama, Its last issue appeared on September 5, 1995, issue number 756, titled "Adiós con la satisfacción de no haber claudicado" (Farewell with the satisfaction of not having given in).

On November 16, 1995, he transferred the rights to the Oiga name to the company Publicaciones de Revistas S.A. in order to pay off his tax debts and the pensions of his 70 workers.

Publicaciones de Revistas S.A was acquired by Eduardo Calmell del Solar, who was close to the Alberto Fujimori government, and he restarted publishing in the year 2000, supporting the Fujimori reelection campaign; it again closed in 2003. In 1998, at Igartua's behest, a work group was created with the intention of reviving Oiga, and this finally took place on February 14, 2008, when the brand was definitively registered with the National Institute for the Defense of Competition and Intellectual Property of Peru.

Later life and death Between 1995 and 1999, he took part in the first two World Congresses of Basque Communities, at the invitation of the President of the Basque Government. He was in charge of writing up the final minutes of both congresses.

At the end of 2003, Igartua was diagnosed with lung cancer, and on March 24, 2004, he died in Lima.

Among the most important acts in the life of Francisco Igartua are also his participation with the Basque Community in Peru and as a personal guest at the World Congresses on Basque Communities, held in Bilbao.

Igartua received the Medal of Lima in 1998, the Grabriela Mistral Order of the government of Chile in 2001, and the Jerusalem Prize for journalism.

Selected works Siempre un extraño (1995), memoirs Huellas de un destierro (1998), later memoirs Reflexiones entre molinos de viento (1997), a collection La Tina (2000), a collection of tales Andanzas de Federico More, compilation of the best articles by , a teacher and friend to Igartua El género revisteril en el Perú, essay about the 20th-century history of Peru Unamuno y su camino, article commemorating the 50th anniversary of the death of Miguel de Unamuno José Luis Bustamante y Rivero, Patriarca de la Democracia, article commemorating the death of the former Constitutional President, wherein Igartua explains, among other details, the birth of Oiga magazine