Cuba faces uncertain future

The BBC has been kind to him, sometimes even singing his praises, but a number of newspapers have gone into overdrive with their criticism of both the man himself and his regime. One paper went so far as to refer to him as a megalomaniac who has been running a corrupt, brutal and inefficient state that will collapse into criminality when he dies.

On a personal note, I have seen the man only once and that was at Piarco when Prime Minister Dr Eric Williams invited Prime Minister Errol Barrow of Barbados and President Forbes Burnham of Guyana to an airport meeting with the Cuban leader who was intransit, I believe, to the Soviet Union.

But there has been a closer bond, in my mind anyway, between Dr Castro and myself because his name first started hitting the headlines at about the same time that I began working as a newsman. My first news job was with Radio Guardian (610) in 1957 and this coincided with Castro’s push into Havana through Oriente province and over Camaguey.

Now, please understand that I am writing from memory which, as you know, can play terrible tricks. But I do remember for certain that Ed Fung, myself and others in the newsroom were reporting almost daily on the progress of the “rebel leader,” as he and his “band of guerrillas” battled their way to the capital.

You will notice that I have referred to the Cuban leader as Dr Castro. The great Larry Heywood, who was Programme Director of Radio Guardian at the time, insisted that we did this, especially after Castro came to power.

Larry’s argument was quite simple. Like it or not, the man was now the Cuban leader. And since he held a doctorate in law, the appropriate respect should be given to him. Although he never said so, I suspect that Larry was of the view that not giving Castro his proper title was the same as referring to the Trinidad and Tobago premier as Williams.

But enough of that and a bit more about Castro himself. He was born into a large prosperous Cuban farming family in 1926. He attended Jesuit schools and later studied law in Havana. During his student years, he was a political activist. Upon receiving his degree in 1950, he established a private law practice and joined the reformist Cuban People’s Party.

In 1952, he planned to run for a parliamentary seat. However, General Batista overthrew the government and cancelled the election. Castro first challenged the Batista regime in court but when that failed to bring him the result he wanted, he organised a rebel force in 1953. He was arrested, tried and put in jail until 1955.

He next went to Mexico to organise a new force, one that became known as the 26 of July Movement. In 1956, this group launched an attack but met with a bloody defeat. Castro and his followers next began a guerrilla war against Batista and quickly built a large following, thanks to an effective propaganda campaign. He triumphantly took power in January 1959.

As it turned out, his revolution involved a far-reaching transformation of Cuban society. This was led by the state which, for its part, was dominated by the communist party. The hostility of the United States could be taken for granted virtually from the start. Washington, under President Eisenhower, had already resolved to bring the Castro regime down, by violence if necessary.

Disinclined to work with the Americans, and in the face of US hostility, Castro quickly intensified his cooperation with the Soviet Union. Cuba-US relations deteriorated further when John Kennedy entered the White House. Relations reached a crisis point with the ill-fated CIA-sponsored Bay of Pigs invasion by Cuban exiles in April 1961.

This event contributed heavily to the Soviet decision the following year to station nuclear missiles in Cuba. What followed came to be known as the Cuban Missile Crisis which brought the world as close to the brink of nuclear war as it has ever been.

Some say that President Castro has remained fairly popular in Cuba. Many Cubans seem to benefit from the redistribution, education and health policies of his regime. Although he has never held an open election, scholars argue that during the early years, he could have won one quite easily.

But not everyone takes such a benign view of the Castro regime. There are those who believe we are now seeing the last days of a monster. They say that he has executed trade unionists and imprisoned dissidents and journalists for indefinite periods. The country has strict food rationing and the rations are meagre and liable to be cut further anytime.

Cubans therefore spend a lot of their energy trying to get more food on the black market, including bribing supervisors at government warehouses. When some parents were once caught giving their children a banana to take to school to supplement their rice-and-beans lunch, they were told that this was forbidden as a counter-revolutionary act.

Such stories abound side by side with stories that sing the praises of the health service and the education system. But the question must be asked that if things are so good in Cuba, why do so many thousands risk their lives to make the 90-mile sea crossing to the United States, despite the dangers that go with it? Whatever the answer to that question, one thing is certain. Cuba is heading for a nasty period of upheaval when Dr Castro can no longer call the shots.