Cuba: Alejandro Gil Will Not Be the Only One to Fall
We must ask not only who carried out the rigorous investigation but who approved it.
By Reinaldo Escobar (14ymedio)
HAVANA TIMES – An unusual “official note” made public the depth of the fall of Alejandro Gil Fernandez, Cuba’s now ousted Minister of Economy and Planning. Readers of the the Communist Party press already know that this headline discloses the most important information, but this note was not signed by a ministry or a state entity, but by the leader of the Government and the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC).
Miguel Díaz-Canel had congratulated Gil a month earlier on his 60th birthday and in another tweet, where the president was delicate with defenestrated ministers, including Gil, when he told them: “They gave their energies in very hard years for the country. They will have tasks to continue doing for Cuba.”
The March 7 note is obscure and imprecise. It does not reveal who was in charge of the “rigorous investigation” that determined the “serious mistakes” made by Gil in the performance of his duties. Later it adds that, given “the level of verification of the facts, and at the proposal of the Attorney General’s Office,” the Political Bureau and the Council of State approved that the Ministry of the Interior initiate “the corresponding actions for the clarification of these behaviors.” By the way, the mistakes made in the exercise of a position are not conduct or crimes.
Here you have to ask yourself not only who carried out the rigorous investigation but who approved it. Rumors point to a namesake of Alejandro, who, it seems, has the power to investigate without waiting for permission.
The lack of precision becomes more evident when one tries to identify the nature of the facts with the mention of three generalities taken from a moral code: “corruption, pretense and insensitivity.” They are mentioned as part of the ethics of the Revolution that “has never allowed, nor will ever allow them.” The president (Díaz-Canel) lacked “revolutionary firmness” by limiting himself to these insinuations.
What is most heard right now in the streets of Cuba are questions, and the most frequent refer to whether other heads will roll below and even above the level of the accused former minister. It is not very credible that such a hierarchical corruption plot can be carried out without others noticing or knowing it.
Although they are different cases, today the same questions return as those that surrounded the so-called Case number 1 of 1989*, which began on June 14 with an informative note from Granma and ended on July 13 with the execution of the main characters involved.
If, under the accusation of breaking the stained glass window of a commercial establishment in the middle of a citizen protest, several people have been sentenced to prison terms of 12 or 15 years, what will be the request of the Prosecutor’s Office for Alejandro Gil and his accomplices? Will there be a public trial? Who is going to sign the next “official note”?
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*Translator’s note: A reference to General Arnaldo Ochoa, who was found guilty of drug smuggling among other crimes and was executed by firing squad.
Translated by Regina Anavy for Translating Cuba