It was curious to walk through the streets of central Havana in those days that followed the death of dictator Fidel Castro, who turns five this Thursday (25).
On the night that international leaders gathered in the Plaza de la Revolución for the final tributes to the leader of the Cuban Revolution (1959), there was a fundamental difference in the reaction of different generations of Cubans. There were those who appeared hugging photos of the revolutionary leader or carrying banners and posters, some crying, others with an air of regret. These were generally older people. Some children accompanied their parents, or grandparents, to build the small altars with their image that remained for days in the streets of Havana.
There was, however, neither the commotion nor the social explosion that much of the international media was imagining, as if the event could mean a watershed or the end of the regime.
On one side were the official solemnities and the dismayed supporters of the Castros. On the other, you could see a youth who reacted by looking at everything with disinterest and dismay. Others seemed even more concerned about looking for wifi points, the only places on the island where you can connect to the internet, and which are in some squares, certain corners or tourist streets. I remember asking some of the young people there about what they were feeling. The indifference appeared in the form of phrases like: “I didn’t even know Fidel was still alive”, or “his death doesn’t change anything, before he got sick, he already set everything up so that nothing would ever change around here”.
How much has happened since then!
His brother had been at the helm of the country since 2008. With Fidel still alive, Raúl had initiated some reforms that raised national spirits, signaling not only an economic opening but also a rapprochement with the US that could, who knows, one day, mean the end of the embargo.
Donald Trump’s election put these advances on the back burner. The possibility of eliminating the barriers that prevent the arrival of food, medicine and many other items that make shortages a chronic problem in the country has been far from reaching Cuba.
Raúl, in turn, was replaced by Miguel Díaz-Canel in 2018, who also signaled changes in the island’s management.
A new Constitution was enacted in 2019, full of beautiful words about freedom of expression and association, and even an item that allowed for peaceful demonstrations in the streets. However, the idea of realizing a “socialist rule of law” did not go ahead. A siege to the activities of artists and intellectuals created a strong reaction from this sector. Scattered in different groups across the island, collectives started to get together to read poems, perform performances and fight against censorship. The rage unleashed against artists by the regime was from the beginning unreasonable. Since then, any young person with a cell phone in their hand is considered a threat to the system, and prisons have been filling up with political prisoners.
The soup was overflowing until, on the 11th and 12th of July, the island experienced an unprecedented moment. Thousands of people voluntarily took to the streets to peacefully protest against the government, the shortages, the economic conditions deteriorated by the effects of the pandemic. The repression was brutal that day – there was one death and hundreds of arrests.
A second demonstration, which was scheduled for last November 15, was hushed down to its minutest detail. Opponents had their homes surrounded, some later being driven out of the country with the clothes on their backs. Many others were arrested just for having come out in white on the streets. Even a 15-year-old boy, Reniel Rodríguez (@LunaticoDebates), spent a few days behind bars, illegally, just because he left home wearing a white shirt, filming and showing what he saw through his social networks. in the streets.
Although the regime has celebrated the “roaring failure” of the protests, which it said were articulated by the US, it is clear that the game is already another in the country. Knowing that he will not be able to maintain the ongoing repression, Díaz-Canel has taken some steps to try to calm the population. Among them, the legalization of a small group of private companies, to alleviate the pressure in this sector. Others, more contorted, involve agreeing with Daniel Ortega’s Nicaragua that Cubans can travel there without a visa. With this, it is expected that a considerable group of Cubans will take this alternative, in the hope of arriving in the United States from Nicaragua and increasing from there the value of the remittances of dollars to the island. In this regard, the regime has been turning a blind eye, allowing money to enter the country, even if illegally, because it helps to keep an economy in a coma alive.
If these measures are enough to contain tempers and the repressive power remains at the same degree, the regime may survive. On the other hand, the voices calling for democracy on the island do not seem to want to be silent. With each neutralized leader or who goes into exile, others appear. Atomization is a force of resistance.
