The Cuban Nation And The Cuba Of The Castro Brothers

The Cuban Nation And The Cuba Of The Castro Brothers / 14ymedio, Jorge
Hernandez Fonseca
Posted on January 5, 2016

14ymedio, Jose Hernandez Fonseca, 5 January 2016 – When the current and
voluminous world news talks about Cuba it is understood that it is
talking about the Castro brothers' Cuba. This, of course, for the
quarter of the island's population that lives abroad, is an inaccuracy.
The real Cuba is the sum of the two separate worlds: the island governed
by the Castro regime and the Cubans who live scattered around the rest
of the world.

In reality, the Cuban nation is a dichotomy. There is the Cuba that
survives on the island, whose basic aspiration is to leave and go abroad
to free itself from an impoverished dictatorship; and the Cuba that has
been reborn far from home, in other latitudes, that longs for and
venerates the island. In reality they are two Cubas: one subjugated and
poor and the other burgeoning and rich, as the island was in the past
and will be in the future. In any event, Miami is what Havana would have
been without Fidel Castro.

It is important to say that Cuba, prior to the Castro dictatorship, had
the highest indicators of economic and social development in all of
Latin America: the second highest per capita income, the highest per
capita consumption of electricity, the lowest rate of illiteracy, the
greatest number of daily newspapers, the highest number of cars per
capita, the highest consumption of protein and one of the highest
numbers of cattle per inhabitant, the highest average wage, more movie
theaters than Paris and a long list of other attributes that included
being the center of the world's music.

It is true that before the current Castro dictatorship there was another
dictatorship, but that one limited itself to circumscribing political
liberties, allowing economic, social and human development typical of
the first world. The people of Cuba fought against the previous
dictatorship, but never with the intention to create an impoverished
totalitarianism like the absurdity imposed by the Castros.

It must be said, moreover, that "the best" of Cuban society is outside
the island. The best athletes, artists, writers, engineers, architects,
intellectuals, journalists, comedians, musicians, teachers, politicians,
among other professionals – or simply workers – live outside the island,
forced by the mandate of obedience and emasculation that has been
militarily imposed within Cuba by the Castro regime.

Faced with this reality, it is inappropriate to try to solve "the Cuban
problem" without recourse to the effort, capital, entrepreneurship and
leadership of the quarter of the Cuban population abroad. The effort of
the United States to inject the entrepreneurial and/or democratic virus
within the island means nothing, if the most dynamic part of the Cuban
population is prevented from participating, investing, leading and even
governing, the Cuban nation of the future.

Let's not fool ourselves, no nation has emerged from the status of
Haitianization that Cuba is currently subjected to without the
participation of its best children, those who have triumphed in the
conditions of exile, not only in the United States but everywhere in the
world. Cuban intellectuals will insist on their patriotic values,
whether they love or hate the dictatorship and its allies. The
recognition of every Cuban is the only formula to shape the Cuban nation
of the future.

Source: The Cuban Nation And The Cuba Of The Castro Brothers / 14ymedio,
Jorge Hernandez Fonseca | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/the-cuban-nation-and-the-cuba-of-the-castro-brothers-14ymedio-jorge-hernandez-fonseca/