Pablo Echenique, the wheelchair-bound "revolutionary" who won over Podemos (photo)

PABLO ECHENIQUE –

He's thirty-eight years old, but he's seen a lot in life. Born in Argentina, he now lives in Spain. He is a theoretical physicist who has turned to politics where he is achieving great success: first as a member of the European Parliament and currently in charge of the organisation and programme of Podemos., the second in command of the party. To achieve these goals, however, Paul Echenique He had to work a little harder than the others. In fact, since he was a child, lives on a wheelchair, weighing 150 kilograms, which he operates with his left hand. And it's a miracle that he's alive, as he himself says: "the majority of people who are diagnosed withspinal muscular atrophy he dies quickly, within the first two years of his life. But I am here.” A true secular miracle, as Pablo defines it.

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WE CAN –

From his wheelchair, thanks to a convincing way of speaking, without the emphasis of the revolutionary or the certainties of the scientist, he managed to carve out a key role for himself in a political force that came close to overtaking the socialists. Last February, in fact, he was the second most voted in the lists for "Vistalegre 2”, the Podemos congressional assembly. Thus today, within the Spanish left-wing party-movement that has its roots in the "Indignados" protests and the talk shows of the television program La Tuerka, he is the "number two" behind the other Pablo, Iglesias.

POLITICIAN WITH DISABILITIES –

Faithful traveling companion on this bumpy journey, there has always been the wifeMarialé, a Venezuelan, married in the Canary Islands after a brief courtship on Facebook. Their love began in Zaragoza when she was wandering around the Rio Ebro campus looking for her office. From this relationship came a important support that helped Pablo to accept with great realism the fact that he could hardly lift even a glass of water. An awareness that would discourage many, but not Echenique who on the contrary he proudly faces those who look at him with respectful commiseration. “We have no idea,” he wrote some time ago in a blog post, “what makes us happy, nor how, where, when, and why they make us happy. But everyone can be happy, despite everything. And I am.” A true manifesto of life from which each of us should draw heavily.

The photos are taken from the Facebook page of Paul Echenique

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