Such was the sad, tired scene during the Fifth Congress of the Cuban Communist Party, timed to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the death of revolutionary hero Ernesto ``Che'' Guevara.
``I'm sure that Che would feel proud of the merits and virtues of the Revolution . . . ,'' Castro was quoted in the government newspaper as saying. He didn't mention that all trace of Guevara's ideas -- his anti-Soviet premonitions and ``moral man'' beliefs -- vanished long ago, as Guevara was pushed out of Cuba in the mid-1960s by a Castro unwilling to tolerate a charismatic rival.
A centerpiece of the congress was The Party of Unity, Democracy, and
Human Rights That We Defend, a platform circulated for months. Proposing
only more of the sorry, totalitarian past, the document advocated
socialism and a single party for Cuba into the new millennium. A
multiparty system, it suggests, leads to ``politicking, injustice, abuse,
demagogical promises never fulfilled, fraud, corruption, and the
debasement of politics.'' Yet Cuba's totalitarian Communist Party is
characterized as ``true democracy'' where ``there is no
possible breach between the leaders and the people.''
All the double talk would be comic were it not so tragic. Thanks to oppressive, incompetent, and corrupt state control, Cuba's economy is in the dumps. Sugar harvests are in continual slide. Child prostitutes walk the Malecon for hard currency. And that self-anointed one-party government continues to harass and jail those who dare dissent from the party line.
Prime examples are Felix Antonio Bonne Carcasses, Rene Gomez Manzano, Vladimiro Roca Antunez, and Marta Beatriz Roque Cabello, all imprisoned since July. Their crime: to release The Fatherland Belongs to Everyone, their own analysis and eloquent response to the Communist Party's dreary, self-deluding platform.
``The government's philosophy is not to serve the people, but to be their dictator. The main objective is not to guarantee citizens a respectable quality of life. Power, via totalitarian control, is the end that the party pursues. No longer does anyone fool himself [into believing] in the social justice that has been so expounded,'' the dissidents wrote. Their proposed alternatives: economic freedom, democratization, opposition parties, respect for the rule of law and human rights, free travel outside of Cuba, and other freedoms.
These are the minimum requirements of legitimate governance. Castro meets none of them. Never has. Never will.
Copyright © 1997 The Miami
Herald