Maradona’s body and memory still hypnotize 1 year after his death

Less than a month before he died, Diego Armando Maradona told his lawyer, Matías Morla, that he wanted to be embalmed. The body of the Argentine idol, according to the version of its representative, should be exposed for public visitation.

The wish, ignored by the family, was registered at a registry office.

A year after his death, Maradona is still able to mobilize the country. Due to heart failure, he died on November 25, 2020.

“There was a group of angry bars from the Gymnasium that planned to invade [a funerária] and extract his heart. This did not happen because it was an act of enormous daring. It was detected that this was going to happen, so the heart was also extracted to study it because her heart was very important in determining the cause of death. Evidently, the information is that he is buried without a heart,” said physician and journalist Nelson Castro in a TV program.

In another proportion, it is as if Argentina has revived its obsession with Eva Perón’s corpse. In her biography about the first lady, Alicia Dujovne Ortiz narrates the saga of Evita’s body, kidnapped, raped and buried just 20 years after her death.

The “theft” of Maradona’s heart wasn’t the only start. There was a concern that organized fans of the same Gymnasium and Boca Juniors could snatch the idol’s body before the wake to take him to the fields of the two teams.

On the way to Casa Rosada, seat of the Argentine government in Buenos Aires, where it was veiled, the coffin passed by the Diego Armando Maradona stadium, belonging to Argentinos Juniors, his first professional team and the preferred club of the President of the Republic, Alberto Fernández.

The idol is buried in Bella Vista, in a private cemetery about 45 km from the capital. It is also where the remains of his parents, Diego and Tota are located.

The image of the 1986 world champion jersey is still present in all rounds of the national championship. Most of the top 30 teams have murals with the star’s face in their stadiums. His former teammates appear almost every week in the press and quote him. There are those who are constant figures on TV, like defender Oscar Ruggeri and goalkeeper Sergio Goycochea.

The intersection of Rua Segurola and Rua Habana, in Villa Devoto, an upper-class neighborhood in the capital, was renamed this month as the corner of Diego Maradona. He lived there and still owned an apartment at the address when he died.

“He was a wonderful boy, a sweet person. But I only talk about Diego. Not about Maradona. I always say one thing: with Diego, I would share my whole life. around him”, opines Fernando Signorini, the striker’s private physical trainer for years and later a member of Argentina’s coaching staff in the 1986, 1990 and 2010 World Cups.

It is a variation of another definition that he himself coined about the shirt 10 and that has become one of the most famous: that with Diego he would go to the end of the world, but with Maradona he would not take a step.
Signorini launched the book “Diego, Desde Adentro” last month, in partnership with Argentine journalist Luciano Wernicke. It is one of several works written about the attacker since his death.

A month ago, from October 29th to November 1st, all the games of different divisions of local football paid homage to Maradona, who would turn 61 on October 23rd. One of them was made by Boca Juniors, who delivered a plaque to their daughter Dalma.

She is the most visible figure in the legal dispute with Matías Morla. The lawyer registered 147 trademarks related to Maradona to Sattvica SA, a company registered in his name. Daughters Dalma and Giannina and Diego’s ex-wife, Claudia Villafañe, allege that the request was irregular. They won in the first instance, but in August of this year the Court returned the rights to Morla. The case is ongoing.

The dispute turned into an internal feud in the Maradona family. Morla enlisted Diego’s sisters to her side.

Dalma accuses the lawyer of having made an agreement with physician Leopoldo Luque to issue a report determining that Maradona should be housed in a house when his daughters wanted him to be admitted to a clinic to treat alcoholism.

Luque, the player’s personal physician, is one of those indicted for involuntary manslaughter, because the rules on home care were not respected that November 2020. Maradona was taken to a mansion on the outskirts of Buenos Aires where, among other things, there was no 24-hour medical follow-up.

Part of the goods left by the idol are still in two containers, kept in a warehouse in the capital awaiting a court order. The same for properties that were in his name and financial investments. It is unclear the whereabouts of the ring valued at 300,000 euros (R$ 1.9 million at current prices) that he loved to wear in games as coach of Gimnasia y Esgrima La Plata.

The jewel was a gift that he won during his time as president (but not in office) of the Dynamo Brest, from Belarus, from 2018 to 2019. During his quick passage through the country, he also won an amphibious tank. He left it behind when he returned to Argentina. He did the same with the two Rolls-Royces he used in Fujairah, in the United Arab Emirates. He found that importing them into Buenos Aires would be more expensive than the value of the vehicles.

Not that her story has remained immaculate in the 12 months since her death. Cuban Mavys Álvarez Rego claims to have had a relationship with Maradona and to have been raped by him.

At the time, she was 16 years old and living in Havana, where the Argentine was undergoing drug treatment in the early 2000s. Or should have, since Mavys claims that the former player offered him cocaine.

“Once, my mother knocked on the bedroom door, but Diego wouldn’t let her in. Then he put his hand over my mouth and raped me,” he accused.

Maradona also died while facing six paternity suits. Four of them are Cuban teenagers.