Spanish Conqueror Pizarro’s Statue Returns To Peru, Sparking Debate Colonial Legacy

A towering bronze statue of Francisco Pizarro, the Spanish conquistador who led the defeat of the Inca Empire, has been reinstalled near its original location in Lima’s main square after a 22-year absence. The seven-tonne, five-meter-tall sculpture was unveiled on Saturday during the 490th anniversary celebrations of Lima’s founding.

The statue of Pizarro on horseback with a drawn sword was inaugurated again yesterday by Lima’s far-right mayor Rafael Lopez Aliaga and Isabel Diaz Ayuso, the regional president of Madrid from Spain’s conservative People’s Party. The ceremony, staged under tight security with the main square closed to the public, intended to rehabilitate the controversial legacy of Pizarro.

Diaz Ayuso has faced the public, declaring the statue represents “the birth of a city and the beginning of a historic encounter that transformed the world.” According to her, the fact that the return of the statue is to the center of Lima is respect for the history of this city.

This reinstatement has raised polarized sentiments in a nation still struggling with its colonial legacy. Pizarro is such a divisive leader, who captained the abduction and execution of the Inca emperor Atahualpa back in the 16th century by ransoming him for gold and silver. The conquest of Cusco as the capital of the Inca, and in 1535 the founding of Lima as the capital of Spanish Viceroyalty until its independence in 1821 by Peru, are indeed the most debatable chapters of the history of Peru.

Protesters at the rally, some playing traditional Andean instruments and chanting slogans such as “Out with Pizarro” and “genocide,” denounced the event. Former presidential candidate Yonhy Lescano condemned it on social media, praising indigenous heroes like Tupac Amaru and Micaela Bastidas who resisted Spanish rule, saying, “We stopped being a colony long ago.”

Despite the opposition, the statue remains as a symbol of the complicated and sometimes painful history of colonialism in Peru.