Cuban priest Alberto Reyes posted on his Facebook account a painful reflection on the island has situation since the revolution led by the late dictator Fidel Castro.
“I thought about crying out in the desert. Sixty-four years is a long time,” Reyes begins his post, referring to 1959, the year the Castros came to power.
“A long time in which to see life in the place where you were born and raised become more and more uncertain and difficult; to see the land become more barren, hope more scarce, and the desire to escape more urgent.”
“It is a long time to spend one’s existence in the presence of survival, without horizons, without dreams, without a future,” the priest continues in his publication.
“Sixty-four years is more than enough time to realize that the project called the ‘Cuban Revolution’ has not worked because it has not brought progress, nor has it achieved its ideal of the ‘new man,’ nor has it solved the problems it promised to solve, nor has it conquered the hearts of the people in the long run,” Reyes said.
“Sixty-four years is more than enough time to realize that the power over this people has been maintained in reality by fear, mistrust, hate speech, the systematic exclusion of those who raise a different voice, oppression that knows no limits and is capable of crossing human boundaries,” he adds.
Reyes calls for attention and urges the Cuban people to open their eyes, “Don’t you see and suffer, don’t you have relatives, friends, neighbors, acquaintances… who keep telling you, ‘I can’t go on’ or ‘How long is this going to go on?'”
The priest also stresses “the hopelessness, the disillusionment of young people, the boredom of people” and that every area of social life falls into the category of “problem,” whether it is “food, medicines, transportation, studies, housing, cost of living, care for the elderly.”
The Cuban religious concludes his message by asking citizens to “wake up and face reality.”
“If you see it but think that we are like this because we are not to blame, then it is time for you to face the truth. And if you see it and you don’t question it.”
“You don’t do anything about it, or you don’t even begin to ask yourself what you could do to bring about real change, then not only have you chosen to be a slave, but you have chosen to build your life on the suffering of your people,” Reyes concluded.
Over 72% of Cubans live below the poverty line, and only 14% expect their situation to improve shortly.
This is according to the report on social rights in Cuba, presented last October in Madrid by the Cuban Observatory for Human Rights (OCDH).
The research conducted by this organization included 1,227 face-to-face interviews in 59 municipalities in 14 of Cuba’s 16 provinces.
This report “confirms the increasing deterioration of social rights on the island due to the structural and accumulated crises and the lack of political will of the authorities to make the changes necessary for the country,” the OCDH said.
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