The opposition had promised a great mobilization on Monday in the streets of Cuba, but it did not take place: in question, the fear of repression, an ill-chosen moment and a culture of the demonstration still in its infancy.
Manuel Cuesta Morua, a 58-year-old moderate dissident, made it out of his Havana home to parade. He did not go far: the police were waiting for him and immediately arrested him. Released during the night, he admits that the organization of the march suffered from “a certain improvisation”.
Wanting to make a peaceful demonstration “in front of the power of the State, which concentrates all the violence”, it is “difficult, dangerous and uncontrollable”, that is why it would have been necessary “more strategic planning”, admits -he.
The Facebook group of political debate Archipielago, at the origin of the call for demonstrations, wanted to mobilize for the release of political prisoners, four months after the historic demonstrations of July 11.
These spontaneous gatherings left one dead and dozens injured. Of the 1,270 people arrested, 612 remain in detention, according to the NGO Cubalex.
The culture of massive opposition demonstrations “has only four months in Cuba, it is too little to hope for miracles”, regrets Cuesta Morua.
The arrival of mobile Internet in Cuba at the end of 2018 gave birth to a new generation of connected dissidents, who are very popular on social networks.
On July 11, messages and videos on Twitter and Facebook had extended the mobilization throughout the island, which was then going through its worst moment of the pandemic, with an economic crisis causing shortages of food and medicines.
” Brake on “
That day, “everything contributed to the demonstrations, including spontaneity,” recalls ex-diplomat Carlos Alzugaray. On the contrary, Monday marked the reopening of the country to tourism and schools.
And for lack of any surprise effect, the entire police arsenal was deployed, with a large number of officers in uniform and in civilian clothes.
The result: “at least a hundred arbitrary arrests and 131 people prevented from leaving their homes by the police”, or even insulted by government sympathizers gathered in front of their home, according to the dissident platform Cuba Decide.
Playwright Yunior Garcia, 39, creator of Archipiélago, was stranded at home on Sunday, before becoming unreachable. He left the country in a hurry and arrived in Madrid on Wednesday, government sources told AFP.
“Nobody went out to demonstrate” because there is “fear and repression,” said Adrian Fonseca, while smoking a cigarette in front of his beauty salon, in the Vedado district.
The sentences of up to 30 years in prison required against certain demonstrators of July 11 also “put a brake”, notes the 33-year-old hairdresser.
“I also want changes, because I am young and I want new things, good things for my country”, confides Karla Amanda, 22-year-old educator, but the dissidents of Archipiélago “do not offer any solution and have no no support ”.
International attention
The Communist government, which had banned the parade and threatened the organizers with criminal sanctions, claimed to have lived on Monday a “festive” day, mocking this “failed operation”, which it considered piloted by the United States.
“Apparently some of my colleagues in Washington dressed for nothing, for their party which did not take place,” quipped Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez.
Dissent refuses to see it as a defeat.
“This November 15 was not at all a failure, quite the contrary”, assures Saily Gonzalez, coordinator of Archipiélago, vilified Monday by more than 70 communist militants in front of his house, in Santa Clara (center).
According to her, this helped to show what happens to “those who do not agree with the political system of the dictatorship”.
“We succeeded in making that there is an individual request for freedom”, some having dressed themselves in white, as the instruction wanted, to go out alone in the street, “as an individual act to demand their rights, in proving that in Cuba there are people who do not agree and oppose the regime ”.
Cuesta Morua also hails “a superb success” by the national and international attention generated.
Political scientist Harold Cardenas hopes that “economic improvement and signals of a minimum of democratic commitment” will eventually calm the growing social unrest in Cuba.
But for now, the “signals coming from the Palace of the Revolution seem to take more pleasure in revolutionary symbolism and ideological roots”.