Victorio Codovilla

Born Feb. 8, 1894, in the village of Ottobiano in the province of Pavia, Italy; died Apr. 15, 1970 in Moscow. Figure in the Argentinian and international workers’ movement. The son of a petty trader.

Codovilla studied in a commercial school. In 1911 he became a member of the Socialist Party of Italy. In 1912, government persecutions of his revolutionary activity drove him to emigrate to Argentina, where he joined the Socialist Party of Argentina and soon headed its left wing. Codovilla helped found the socialist newspaper La Internacional. He greeted the Great October Revolution with enthusiasm and organized the actions of the Argentinian workers in defense of the young Soviet republic. Codovilla was one of the founders of the Communist Party of Argentina (CPA; founded in 1918; until 1920 it was known as the International Socialist Party), and he was a member of the party’s Central Committee and of the Executive Committee of the Central Committee from the beginning. From 1926 to 1928 he was the CPA’s representative to the Executive Committee of the Comintern, and from 1928 to 1930 he served as the secretary of the South American bureau of the Comintern. From 1941 to 1963, Codovilla was secretary of the Central Committee of the CPA. In 1963 he became chairman of the CPA.

Codovilla was frequently persecuted, imprisoned, and exiled for his revolutionary activity. His theoretical works maintain the purity of Marxism-Leninism from revisionism and sectarianism, defend the unity of the international Communist and workers’ movement, and advocate peaceful coexistence. Codovilla was awarded the Order of the October Revolution in 1969.