Cuba is Still Living a Revolution

Elio Delgado Legon

HAVANA TIMES – After 150 years of struggle and great sacrifice, the Cuban Revolution has managed to make our heroes’ dreams come true as of January 1, 1959 and it continues to be present in the vast majority of Cubans’ minds because it is a people’s revolution for the people, which means we can confidently say that Cuba continues to be a country living in revolution.

Of course, some people, who didn’t see capitalism in Cuba and only know about it from history books, are dazzled by capitalist propaganda in developed nations, but they don’t see what Capitalism is in developing countries, which are far worse off today, 60 years later, than Cuba was before the Revolution.

Today, we watch bloodchilling scenes in relatively developed and wealthy countries, such as Brazil and Argentina. The first has over 50 million citizens living in poverty, 30 million living in extreme poverty, especially in rural areas and the favelas around large cities; the second, with thousands of families living out on the street because they can’t afford to pay rent, a phenomenon that we also find in large US cities.

The situation is even worse in other Latin American countries because poverty and a lack of work is combined with violence and drugs, which makes thousands and thousands of people (including entire families with small children) walk thousands of kilometers to reach the US border, with the hope of leading a better life.

The Cuban Revolution hasn’t been able to give its people all of the prosperity it set out to as it has had to navigate extremely tough obstacles that a powerful enemy has placed in its way, showing no mercy and doing whatever it can to make our revolutionary project fail so it can then say that Cuban socialism doesn’t work. However, none of the evils and disastrous situations that I’ve mentioned above have been present in Cuba after the Revolution triumphed. For example, unemployment doesn’t exist in Cuba, it’s the opposite in fact, there is a shortage of labor in many sectors.

When it comes to food, Cubans have been guaranteed a certain amount of food at subsidised rates so that even the poorest person won’t starve. And as well as this supply, which is practically handed out, we can buy how ever much we want on the market at a normal price.

Education is free at every level and there aren’t private schools, as this is considered to be the State’s obligation. It’s the same thing with medical care and medicines given at hospitals, while the medicines we buy at pharmacies are also subsidised by the State, regardless of how much imported medicines cost on the foreign market and how much nationally produced medicines are. Over 50% of the state budget is allocated to education and healthcare which doesn’t happen anywhere else in the world.

The Cuban people also have access to sports and culture, which complete the benefits (which I’ve mentioned above) that they enjoy and which they are willing to fight for against the efforts of those who want our revolutionary project to fail, both enemies abroad, as well as annexationists and counter-revolutionaries on the island, who prefer to go back to living under Imperialism’s yoke. This is why Cuba is and will continue to be a country living a revolution.