Ricardo Letts Colmenares (August 9, 1937 – May 18, 2021)[1] was a Peruvian politician, journalist and left-wing militant.
[2] Born in Lima, his parents were Roberto Letts Sánchez, an agricultural businessman and Josefina Colmenares Castro, a housewife devoted to her family.
In 1963, he obtained his professional degree as an Agricultural Engineer with his thesis “Economic and Political Justification of the Peruvian Agrarian Reform”.
Ricardo Letts was a consultant to the Confederación Campesina del Perú – CCP (Peasant Confederation of Peru)[7] (1962–1977).
He was also president of the Consejo Unitario Nacional Agrario - CUNA (National Unitary Agrarian Council), (1985–1990).
In 1970, while Secretary General of Vanguardia Revolucionaria, he was arrested and deported to Colombia while he was en route to a public debate in a university round table.
In 1974 he was arrested again after an intense activity supporting a peasant trade union organization and the land-taking movement in Andahuaylas.
In 1990, Letts was elected to the National Congress as deputy of Lima for the Izquierda Unida (United Left) party.
There, along with Lourdes Flores and Fernando Olivera, he led the triumphant constitutional charge for illicit enrichment against Alan García Pérez.
When Javier Diez Canseco proposed dissolving the PUM, he renounced at the same time that he was reaffirming his Socialist and Mariateguist principles in 1996.
The same date and time that General Rodolfo Robles [1], who had denounced the Cantuta (12) assassinations, a missile was fired at Letts's olive orchard in Paracas.
In February 2001, on behalf of CM, Letts accused Alan García Pérez to the prosecutor on duty for the prison massacre and genocides of June 18 and 19, 1986.
Between 2004 and 2005, he and the CM participated in the Movimiento del Frente Amplio - FA (Foundation Movement Broad Front) also conformed by the Movimiento Nueva Izquierda – MNI (New Left Movement), Partido Comunista del Perú – Patria Roja PCP(PR)(Communist Party of Peru - Red Fatherland), Partido Comunista del Perú – PCP (Peruvian Communist Party), Partido Socialista Revolucionario – PSR (Revolutionary Socialist Party), Frente Popular – FP (Popular Front), Frente Obrero Campesino del Perú – FOCEP (Peasant Labor Front of Peru),[15] Movimiento Democrático Pueblo Unido – MDPU Democratic (Movement United People),[16] and Partido Nacionalista de las Comunidades Andinas – PANACA (Nationalist Party of the Andean Communities).
He also left the management of the ANPEAP and Convención Nacional del Agro Peruano – CONVEAGRO (National Convention of the Peruvian Agriculture), in order to spend all his time in the political struggle from the CM direction.