What Are Andy Garcia & Gloria Estefan up to?
HAVANA TIMES, March 29 – Cuban-Americana singer Gloria Estefan headed a march this past Friday in Miami in support of the Cuban dissident group known as the Ladies in White.
Among the participants in this event were Luis Posada Carriles, who the Venezuelan justice system has accused of masterminding the mid-air bombing of a Cuban commercial aircraft in 1976.
Likewise, actor Andy Garcia headed a protest on Sunday in Los Angeles with the same objective.
Garcia and the Estefans are known for their talent as artists, but also for their political affiliation with the American right wing.
Havana Times invites its readers to reflect on this issue:
What has compelled these artists to lead demonstrations against the Cuban government?
Are they defending the interests of Cubans who live on the island?
Will these marches contribute to better relations between Cuba and the United States?
Participate in the debate.
Share your opinion with other readers of Havana Times.
Estefan’s a goodsinger, but her father was a bodyguard for the dictator Batista, a fact which she’s always spoken of fondly. As a youth, she claims to have worked for the CIA. Garcia has also always been a militant opponent of the Cuban Revolution.
They’ve been encouraged by the strong public opposition which Barack Obama has taken against Cuba, as recently as last week. Obama was interviewed by Estefan, and also by Yoani Sanchez. Their goal isn’t to improve the conditions of people on the island, nor is it designed to do that.
The US and international media have recently escalated its propaganda against Cuba since the death after a hunger strike of a Cuban imprisoned originally for common criminal activity, but who before his death had decided he was a political dissident.
The goal of these demonstrations it to block even the slightest moves toward a relaxation of Washington’s multi-pronged pressure against Cuba: the blockade.
In response:
1. Estefan and Garcia are using their rights to demonstrate pacefully in contrast to the harrasment suffered by the “gladioli armed” ladies in Cuba. Oh, I forget, to use massive, agressive and threatening demonstrations against a peacefull demonstration of a small group of women is just your idea of “goverment suporters right to disagree”
2. No, they are defending the rights of the Ladies in White to pacefully petition their Goverment, aparently something not permitted.
3. The only ones who will benefit from better relations with Cuba are the governing elite and the hungry for new markets US Corporations; certainly not the people in Cuba.
How can any of us determine what motivates others to do that which they do? Such motivation can be seen to come from multi-levels of our lives as opposed to a single motivating factor which can be painted either ‘black’ or ‘white’, good or bad! Ms. Estefan and Mr. Garcia, in all probability, mean well. In reality, they only support the status quo. Such demonstrations in the U.S., in the end, do nothing inside Cuba. If anything, these well-meaning demonstrations may actually do harm to the cause of the Ladys in White. Cubans in Cuba must determine the destiny of their nation. Estefan’s father was a bodyguard in the presidential palace of Batista. His primary job was to protect the wife of Batista. Thus, why would the Ladys in White want the support of the Estefan family? Would it not, to a great extent, discredit their cause? These demonstrations only inflame emotions, they solve nothing and bring no resolution to reconciliation.
Thanks for catching our mistake.
What is an American “ring wing”?