Mother’s Day in Cuba
By Francisco Acevedo
HAVANA TIMES – This day so special for every family in any corner of this planet is more complicated than usual in Cuba, where almost nothing is normal. Celebrating the date with a decent meal is truly an odyssey, and the sacrifices it implies for most Cubans are no secret to anyone. But we won’t dwell too much on that, supposedly everyone following the events in Cuba should be aware of it.
This week, a video of a mother in front of the infamous El Pitirre police station, also known as 15-80, in the municipality of San Miguel del Padrón in Havana, went viral as she demanded the rights of her son, which are being violated along with other prisoners.
“I declare myself in a sit in,” said Migdalia Gutiérrez, mother of Brusnelvis Adrian Cabrera Gutierrez. In the recording, it’s evident that in response, an officer came out and far from providing information about her son, threatened to further complicate her situation.
Like her, around a thousand mothers will be missing their sons this Sunday, imprisoned for peacefully protesting, because it is very clear that those who did so violently constitute a small minority.
This case is also curious because it involves a young man currently 23 years old, who on July 11, 2021, did not participate in the protests in the La Güinera neighborhood in Havana, as several witnesses asserted. The evidence presented by the Prosecutor’s Office at the time was a photo of a young man on a motorcycle that did not show the tattoos that Cabrera Gutierrez has on his arms. According to his mother, the young man was at a pool that day (of which she presented photos), and then went to work on a farm. The sentence claims that the boy “was in the vehicle inciting people, with his hand.”
Cabrera Gutierrez was transferred to another prison after several days of refusing to eat and wear the uniform at the Combinado del Este prison in Havana, where he was originally imprisoned to serve a 10-year sentence.
The political prisoner had gone on strike after learning that he was accused of public disorder for arguing during a visit from his family to Combinado del Este on June 8. It all started when they didn’t let his stepmother see him even though she was included on the visitor list, and they began shouting ‘Down with Díaz-Canel,’ ‘Cuba is a dictatorship,’ and ‘Homeland and life.’
Migdalia’s demands had not stopped after he was initially imprisoned, long before the trial. They included her demand for him to be transferred to a hospital due to blood pressure problems and an apparent jaundice condition that had him visibly weakened and losing weight.
She and other women in identical situations will spend their third straight Mother’s Day without being able to celebrate with their children.
In the midst of this panorama, it also became known in recent days that, in 15 months since its approval, US $20 million has been spent on importing new and used cars to Cuba, with a peak in the first three months of this year. In theory, these are for ordinary citizens or small businesses that are not sanctioned by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), at an average cost of $4,500 for conventional cars, although the list includes other vehicles such as tractors.
Of course, this figure is more than what has been exported from US soil to any other country, because evidently for Columbians, Hondurans, etc., the freight is much more expensive because they have dealerships in their territory.
It is further proof that the economic embargo is not entirely effective, but it still remains the most recurrent argument of the dictatorship to justify everything that is done wrong in this country.
In reality, the measure does apply to the high spheres, but other alternatives are sought and it doesn’t even matter if the embargo is lifted, because even if that would somehow improve the internal situation (denying it would be nonsensical), I don’t think it would solve many of the everyday problems of the average Cuban. It would only serve to give more oxygen to the dictatorship and keep everything the same from a political point of view.
Ninety percent of Cubans cannot even afford an electric motorcycle (through their own effort and not with money from their relatives), let alone think about a car. Even with this relaxation, which includes food, the economic situation is worse than before, power outages persist, entire neighborhoods are without running water, and a long etcetera of calamities, so nothing invites optimism even if some day the embargo is lifted.
Our dear Miguel Díaz-Canel has his greatest excuse there because it’s the perfect excuse for everything, since supposedly he’s not allowed to maneuver to stay afloat. It doesn’t matter that he maintains his luxuries despite everything, because the embargo does not directly affect him, only the general population, which does suffer firsthand.
He will never stand in a bread or gasoline line, nor count pennies to take his relatives for a stroll once a year. His wife will indeed have a good Mother’s Day, savoring dishes unknown to the rest of her fellow citizens in some private haven.