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`Che' remembered, 40 years on

Forty years after his death in Bolivia, Guevara is a living force in the town where his body was paraded.

By 8pm in the main square of the dusty town of Vallegrande, the only sound is the buzz of prayer coming from the church. Inside, devoted Catholics sit and stand around the image of Our Lord of Malta -- the only black Christ in Latin America, brought to this Bolivian town during the Spanish conquest.

But this is not the only foreign element of devotion. Father Agustin, the Polish priest, reads out prayers written down by local people: "For my mother who is sick, I pray to the Lord and ..." hesitantly, "to Saint Ernesto, to the soul of Che Guevara."

"Saint Ernesto," the parishioners murmur in response.

It was here in Vallegrande, 40 years ago, that the corpse of Ernesto "Che" Guevara lay on display, eyes open, in the hospital laundry. And it is here that his unofficial sainthood is becoming firmly established.

"For them, he is just like any other saint," Father Agustin says. "He is just like any other soul they are praying to. One can do nothing."

On a bench in the square, Freddy Vallejos, 27, says: "We have a faith, a confidence in Che. When I go to bed and when I wake up, I first pray to God and then I pray to Che -- and then, everything is all right."

Freddy wears a cap bearing Alberto Korda's iconic image of Guevara.

"Che's presence here is a positive force. I feel it in my skin, I have faith that always, at all times, he has an eye on us," Freddy said.

Guevara, born in Argentina to an impoverished aristocratic family, was caught on Oct. 8, 1967, by US-trained Bolivian rangers as he was trying to open up a new front in his revolution. Guevara was executed the following day in a little adobe school in La Higuera, and his body brought the 112km to Vallegrande.

Forensic experts found his skeleton 10 years ago and it now rests in a mausoleum in Cuba. Standing at the site of his first grave, the president of the Che Guevara Foundation, Osvaldo "Chato" Peredo, said: "Why do we say Che is alive? Because of his grandeur, his transcendence. For us, Che is here, very much alive, in everything we say."

In his 1967 dispatch to the Guardian newspaper in London, journalist Richard Gott, in Vallegrande on the day of Guevara's death, wrote: "It was difficult to recall that this man had once been one of the great figures of Latin America. It was not just that he was a great guerrilla leader; he had been a friend of presidents as well as revolutionaries. His voice had been heard and appreciated in inter-American councils as well as in the jungle."

"He was a doctor, an amateur economist, once minister of industries in revolutionary Cuba, and Castro's right-hand man. He may well go down in history as the greatest continental figure since Bolivar. Legends will be created around his name," Gott wrote.
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