The Castro dictatorship politicizes everything that happens in Cuba, as reflected in a headline in the Granma newspaper, corresponding to the day the regime officially declared the extinction of the fire at the Supertanker base in Matanzas, a devastating human and material tragedy, which adds to the daily vicissitudes of the insular citizen, a particularly painful regret.
The headline read, “The will that conquered the flames” accompanied by a photo of the deputy dictator, Miguel Díaz Canel, along with another official whose main merit was leading the search in Bolivia for the remains of serial killer Ernesto “Che” Guevara, condition that they highlight when writing, “It is no coincidence that the distinguished specialist is at the head of the multidisciplinary team of experts in charge of fulfilling this mission, which reveals the importance offered by the country to these heroes of the fire”.
In a word, the press and the regime do not establish the magnitude of the tragedy by the deaths, disappearances or material damage, but by the forensic team that will be used in the search and identification of the disappeared, whose greatest scientific achievement was to find the remains of one of his thugs.
Another example of how the dictatorship champions everything can be seen in the photo that accompanies the press headline. In any place in the world when similar tragedies occur, the photos and news correspond to the victims and relatives, or individuals who stood out in controlling the disaster, not in Cuba, the official media, the only ones that exist on the island, continue exploiting the narrative that government officials are heroes ready to give their lives to save the nation.
It is also appreciated that the nomenclature has not learned from its failures. The continued use of slogans is present in the headline. The presence of the word “will”, much loved by the dictatorship since the sixties, is a constant in the regime that the subjective can replace the lack of resources and logistics. The revolution has always liked that word, but let us remember that project of Fidel Castro of “hydraulic will” and voluntary work, as if with will the thousands of kilometers of defective pipes could be replaced or alleviate the droughts that in Cuba are particularly severe due to the deforestation carried out by “Che” in the sixties, when he dynamited leafy trees because it was very difficult for bulldozers to uproot them. Tremendous environmentalist.
On the Island, what they called the “hydraulic revolution” was implemented, which, like the rest of its revolutions, only reaped failures, as citizens currently face more problems with water supply than at any other time in the past.
No person with common sense can reject the importance of the will, an important virtue to achieve any goal, but from there to proclaim that it is enough to solve problems, it is an absurdity that demagogues and populists resort to to manipulate their supporters.
In the 1960s, massive volunteer work campaigns were promoted in Cuba. Massive calls to citizens to work days without pay that were usually a resounding economic loss for the state due to the terrible organization of labor management or due to the lack of necessary instruments for the work. Those who refused to participate were differentiated from the rest of the population, a kind of political plague that placed them among those opposed to the process.
On the other hand, there was no lack of people identified with the Revolution who criticized those campaigns that only left the administration lost. Unfortunately, very few realized that the government was investing in a great plan for massification of the citizen, in the conversion of the individual into part of a necessary machinery to preserve the power that has lasted until the present, although unquestionably for years there have been cracks that would bring down the framework.
The consequences of this fire will aggravate the living conditions of Cubans. The eternal ineptitude of the Castro officials and the fear of the hierarchs that the individual assumes their citizen prerogatives will result in greater shortages and numerous blackouts. The situation is difficult, but we have the old and cynical saying, “as good as this is, it is as bad as it is getting”.
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