Agustín Rodríguez Sahagún

Agustin Rodriguez Sahagún (Avila, March 27, 1932 - Paris, October 13, 1991) a was Spanish politician and businessman as well as being a doctor in economics and law who was best known as being the mayor of Madrid from 1989-1991.

He studied law at the University of Deusto in Bilbao, a city in which for some time he devoted to various activities of the publishing business. In 1976 he incorporated the business Federación Empresarial Segoviana. A year later, in 1977, he participated in the founding ot the Spanish Confederation of Small and Medium Enterprises, of which he was elected president.

His career in politics began on February 24 1978, when he became part of the Union of the Democratic Centre (Spain). The next year, in February 1979, took over the defense portfolio, a post he held during the 23-F coup d'état on February 23, 1981.

In that same month he was elected chairman of the UCD, though the party abandoned the following year to accompany Adolfo Suarez in the creation of a new party, the Democratic and Social Center (C.D.S.).

In the municipal elections of 1987, he presented himself as a candidate for the Mayor of Madrid, though he only came in third place. In 1989, the People's Party (P.P.) put him up against the then Mayor of Madrid, Juan Barranco, which Sahagún finally won with 29 votes out of 55. On June 20 Agustin Rodriguez Sahagún was sworn in mayor of the Spanish capital. During his tenure several tunnels were opened to traffic with the objective to decongest Madrid. He remained in office until April 1991, when he resigned out of bad health.

Agustin Rodriguez Sahagún died in Paris on October 13, 1991.

On January 19, 1995 a monument dedicated to the memory of Augustine Rodriguez Sahagúnwas opened, in the Madrid park that also bears his name.

Quote

*"En esta vida hay que ser solución, no problema." (In life you have to be solution, not the problem.)