[R-G] And amidst all of that, Fidel left

[Anthony Fenton]

En Espanol:  http://www.cubaperiodistas.cu/columnistas/ 
pascual_serrano/20.html

And amidst all of that, Fidel left
Pascual Serrano
Tuesday, 1 January, 2008
	
If 17 months ago, when Cuban President Fidel Castro stepped down from  
the political front line because of health problems, they had asked  
the Spanish people what the situation in Cuba would be at the  
beginning of 2008, few would have said that there would be complete  
normality and institutionality. This does not mean that what has  
happened—or not happened—in Cuba has been unforeseen or surprising,  
but it is an example of the ignorance and disinformation that the  
international community suffers from concerning Cuban reality.

We have been hearing about the imminent fall of Cuban socialism for  
decades, about a popular uprising against its rulers or about the  
unbearable desperation of the citizenry. Nevertheless, since the  
illness that obliged Fidel Castro to delegate his responsibilities as  
head of state, all of the members of the government have worked  
normally, the Parliament has met regularly, in October the two rounds  
of local elections were held without incident and without abstention,  
and in January there will be legislative elections. On the other  
hand, here next door in Belgium, without the media and analysts  
commenting much, they have been without a government for six months  
and now they have an interim one. In Cuba none of the ominous  
forecasts of destabilization, refugee crises or protests at the jetty  
have come to pass. The obsession that some have with presenting Cuba  
as a country without institutionality has been so insane that even  
the Spanish high court has made official pronouncements on whether at  
this time Fidel Castro was or was not head of state, a stupid  
statement of interference and arrogance that can only awaken  
understandable outrage on the other side of the Atlantic.

Cuba has witnessed an impeccable institutionality, its president  
delegates his office for health reasons, he remains as a temporary  
advisor to the extent his health allows, and he is replaced by the  
first vice president, Raul Castro, around whom all of the principal  
high government officials come together. Now, on January 20, there  
will be parliamentary elections and it is known that Fidel will be a  
candidate, which indicates that he is being taken into account for  
Cuban politics, as he could not be if it were otherwise. And  
meanwhile, in Cuba the country’s problems are discussed and debated,  
thousands of meetings of the rank-and-file members of the Communist  
Party have generated nearly two million proposals which must be  
considered by the appropriate people in charge. These days, ten  
parliamentary working commissions analyzed and debated the principle  
economic and budgetary issues of the country. Production and  
distribution of food, efficiency, productivity and labor discipline,  
and the energy situation will be taken up without the presence of  
Fidel Castro, in an example of political normality.

While some continue with their pipe dreams of destabilization for  
Cuba, the country has managed to produce half of the fuel that it  
consumes, its historic economic nightmare. Its commercial relations  
with the region are unprecedented: through Petrocaribe, ALBA,  
international educational and health missions, bilateral agreements  
with numerous countries, etc… In foreign policy, its condemnation of  
the U.S. blockade has reached its maximum support in the history of  
voting in the U.N. General Assembly.

Cuba has for the longest time been a country victimized by lies and  
about which we have been deceived. Where they say that there is  
repression and the police have never been seen charging against a  
demonstration, where many opponents live better than the ministers,  
where it is claimed that the Internet is prohibited but all of the  
students, professors, doctors, journalists use it free at work…The  
country that they accuse of being governed by communist dinosaurs but  
whose highest diplomatic official is 44 years old, where they say  
that there are no elections but 96 percent of Cubans vote voluntarily  
and secretly.

Of course Cuba has many problems, uncertainties and much need of  
changes. This is mainly in housing, transportation and the  
improvement of food production for its population. But what is  
suggestive is that they are problems which look easier to solve in  
socialism than in capitalism. In housing the solution is to build,  
while in Spain, the market does not resolve it having two million  
empty houses.  Transportation is easier to solve in Havana through a  
good network of buses or streetcars, than in traffic-congested cities  
such as Caracas or Mexico City. And in food, the challenge is to  
begin to produce on half of the cultivable lands that are idle. It is  
true that there are also problems with inefficiency and corruption,  
but in Cuba nobody puts millions of dollars in his pocket reassessing  
plots of land as in Spain, and no minister spends 150,000 euros on  
trips on private airplanes or 183,000 on entourage, as Eduardo  
Zaplana did according to journalist Alfredo Grimaldos in his latest  
book. To convince the citizens to work efficiently under socialism is  
not easy, under capitalism it is enough to starve those who don’t do  
it; for that reason one of Cuba’s challenges is to find the means to  
motivate that don’t generate insulting and intolerable inequalities.  
That discussion has not been avoided either, Raul Castro brought it  
up clearly in his speech last July 26.

But the biggest outrage for all of those who are obsessed with  
overthrowing Cuban socialism and beginning the plundering is that  
everything is happening with Fidel Castro in the wings. For decades  
they were wrong as they planned for the absence of Castro and they  
have made another mistake now that nature has separated him from  
leadership of the government. There are so many lies about Cuba that  
even the liars believed them and now they don´t understand a thing.
Translation Diana Barahona


Source: Diario Público/Rebelión