Cuba and its domestic dialectics

By Luis Sexto

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Is Cuba moving or not? That's the question posed by analysts and friends, supporters and foes, both inside and outside the island. The Cuban government might be the only one that cannot avoid the questioning, the doubt that some of its acts generate. And it is pelted with stink bombs whether it advances or appears to remain motionless.
Everybody knows that in Cuba there's always "something happening." Although some gaps of information diminish our revolutionary enthusiasm or appear to grant legitimacy to the predictions of those who don't want the socialist republic to advance toward efficiency and effectiveness, many of us are comforted by the knowledge that the nation's most trusted men acknowledge that the 50-year-old aspiration of millions of people may be reaching the brink of hopelessness.
Sometimes we forget the domestic dialectics, which in recent years recorded two key moments: in November 2005, when Fidel warned that the Revolution might implode because of internal errors and vices, and on July 26, 2007, when Raúl spelled out the need to make structural reforms in Cuban society. Never before had the language of the Revolution penetrated so deep into our needs and urgencies as it did in those speeches, doubly historical because of their transcendence and timeliness.
Without minimizing the external causes of the problems and difficulties, those speeches brought part of the solution over into the domestic side, which might explain and justify why the Cuban society leaned toward economic transformations that are not exclusively based on "control and discipline."
I don't know if what I see or perceive is only a flaw in my alleged political shrewdness. I understand that the three hurricanes that devastated several towns and farmland dangerously loosened the soil where the bases had to be rebuilt. In addition, there is in Cuba a kind of "instability" derived from the same circumstances of living (almost everyone of us) from the miracle of depreciated wages, buying products in another currency that's exclusive, rather than inclusive. That crack in a society that's still unsatisfied demands caution before any structural renovation, in a planet that is economically, ecologically and morally bankrupt.
As I see it, Cuba today is a conjunction of doubt, resignation, enthusiasm, and liberating vocation. From that mixture, one can perceive that "something's happening" inside, although outside (particularly in Miami) some -- from a viewpoint that disqualifies and demonizes -- evaluate it in the terms of the liberal and neo-romantic rhetoric of Vargas Vila, who attributes any movement to the alleged struggle between caudillos and groups. This is what has happened after the last recomposition of the government, an act constitutionally scheduled for the beginning of each legislative session and whose postponement was announced on Feb. 24, 2008.
It seems, then, that the Cuban government is the only government in the world that must publicly explain the reasons for its administrative adjustments. But, let's look at this contradiction: if the men remain a long time in their posts, there is criticism about the leaders staying in power "for an eternity," about motionlessness, impunity and other similar arguments. If the government decides to remove some officials and appoint others, using an aseptic and delicate language -- the men are "liberated" or "promoted" -- the scandal sends the Web's newspapers and windows rattling.
How is this possible? What explanation will the Cubans give?
I would have liked to learn about the specific causes for Lage's or Pérez Roque's "liberation," as well as the "liberation" of the other ministers about whom no one shows any interest. Because I live in Cuba and know it without the distortions typical of Miami or Madrid, I don't believe that the change in ministers or officials has been determined by a flap between Raulists and Fidelists. As soon as I hear that some officials have been replaced by their deputies, I realize that "the struggle between groups" is inconceivable. Wasn't Bruno Rodríguez's relationship with the previous Chief of State and Government the same as -- or similar to -- Pérez Roque's?
Now then, the references in a recent Fidel reflection to both high-ranking functionaries were intended to clarify the real reasons for the substitution, which the government's official announcement did not reveal. Apparently, the Leader of the Revolution mentioned those reasons so as to keep people from fantasizing, to restrain speculation from the media, where some analysts earn their living by trying to pin the tail on the donkey while blindfolded.
Maybe us Cubans inside and outside, along with the alleged foreign experts, need to get used to seeing leaders and cadres come and go as they do in any other country, without walking them between two lines of whips, unless they have committed such harm that they deserve a trial or a denunciation broadcast over loudspeakers.
I do not doubt that the ministerial change and the reminder of the constitutional role of the secretaries of the executive committee of the Councils of Ministers and State show that the state organization is moving toward a shape that is less voluminous, better adjusted to the circumstances in Cuba, and thus more efficient. Of course, that has been expressed by the authorities. But this commentator, who has written so much against the bureaucratic procedures, believes that government readjustment can be part of a strategy to "debureaucratize" Cuban society.
For the time being, any other assumption will have to wait for confirmation until the next Communist Party Congress, tentatively set for this year's en. Although many refuse to believe it, any decision, any program that implies changes in the socio-economic structure, has to be approved by the congress of the party in power.
Within logical doubts in a convulsed era, in Cuba there is a certainty that the Revolution and the aspirations of justice, equity and authentic freedom of millions of Cubans have not failed; they've only been delayed. And they would be lost for sure if the helmets of the new barbarians of Attila (as described by Rubén Darío) cross the Straits of Florida. A supreme difference separates us: we're interested above all in independence and social justice. To them, these national values are as important as the extinction of the gazelle is to the lion.

Luis Sexto, a Cuban journalist who won the 2009 José Martí national journalism award, writes a column every Friday in the newspaper Juventud Rebelde. He now contributes regularly to Progreso Semanal/Weekly.