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Dear comrade Alarcón:
Please read the following message,
addressed to the National Assembly, when you
open the morning session.
A heartfelt embrace,
Fidel Castro Ruz
December 27, 2007
8:40 p.m.
Comrades of the National Assembly:
You have no easy task on your hands. On
January 1st, 1959, surrounded by the
accumulated and deepening grievances that our
society inherited from its neo-colonial past
under U.S. domination, many of us dreamed of
creating a fully independent nation where
justice prevailed. In the arduous and uneven
struggle, there came the moment when we were
left completely alone.
Nearly 50 years since the triumph of
the Revolution, we can justifiably feel proud of
ourselves, as we have held our ground, for
almost half a century, in the struggle against
the most powerful empire ever to exist in
history. In the Proclamation I signed on July
31, 2006, none of you saw any signs of nepotism
or an attempt to usurp parliamentary powers.
That year, at once difficult and promising for
the Revolution, the unity of the people, the
Party and State were essential to continue
moving forward and to face the declared threat
of a military action by the United States.
This past December 24, during his visit
to the various districts of the municipality
which honored me with the nomination of
candidate to parliament, Raúl noted that all of
the numerous candidates proposed by the people
of a district famous for its combativeness, but
with a low educational level, had completed
their higher education. This, as he said on
Cuban television, made a profound impression in
him.
Party, State and Government cadres and
grassroots organizations face new problems in
their work with an intelligent, watchful and
educated people who detest bureaucratic hurdles
and inconsiderate justifications. Deep down,
every citizen wages an individual battle against
humanity's innate tendency to stick to its
survival instincts, a natural law which governs
all life.
We are all born marked by that
instinct, which science defines as primary.
Coming face to face with this instinct is
rewarding because it leads us to a dialectical
process and to a constant and altruistic
struggle, bringing us closer to Martí and making
us true communists.
What the international press has
emphasized most in its reports on Cuba in recent
days is the statement I made on the 17th of this
month, in a letter to the director of Cuban
television's Round Table program, where I said
that I am not clinging to power. I could add
that for some time I did, due to my youth and
lack of awareness, when, without any guidance, I
started to leave my political ignorance behind
and became a utopian socialist. It was a stage
in my life when I believed I knew what had to be
done and wanted to be in a position to do it!
What made me change? Life did, delving more
deeply into Martí’s ideas and those of the
classics of socialism. The more deeply I became
involved in the struggle, the stronger was my
identification with those aims and, well before
the revolutionary victory I was already
convinced that it was my duty to fight for these
aims or to die in combat.
We also face great risks that threaten
the human species as a whole. This has become
more and more evident to me since I predicted,
for the first time in Rio de Janeiro, --over 15
years ago, in June 1992-- that a species was
threatened with extinction as a result of the
destruction of its natural habitat. Today, the
number of people who understand the real danger
of this grows every day.
A recent book by Joseph Stiglitz, former
Vice-President of the World Bank and President
Clinton's chief economic advisor until 2002,
Nobel Prize laureate and bestselling author in
the United States, offers up-to-date and
irrefutable facts on the subject. He criticizes
the United States, a country which did not sign
the Kyoto Protocol, for being the largest
producer of carbon dioxide in the world, with
annual emissions of 6 billion tons of this gas
which disturbs the atmosphere without which life
is impossible. In addition to this, the United
States is the largest producer of other
greenhouse gases.
Few people are aware of these facts.
The same economic system which forced this
unsustainable wastefulness on us impedes the
distribution of Stiglitz' book. Only a few
thousand copies of an excellent edition have
been published, enough to guarantee a margin of
profit. This responds to a market demand, which
the publishing house cannot ignore if it is to
survive.
Today, we know that life on Earth has
been protected by the ozone layer, located in
the atmosphere’s outer ring, at an altitude
between 15 to 50 kilometers, in the region known
as the stratosphere, which acts as the planet’s
shield against the type of solar radiation which
can prove harmful. There are greenhouse gases
whose warming potential is higher than that of
carbon dioxide and which widen the hole in the
ozone layer above Antarctica, which loses as
much as 70 percent of its volume every spring.
The effects of this phenomenon, which is
gradually taking place, are humanity's
responsibility.
To have a clear sense of this phenomenon,
suffice it to say that the world produces an
average of 4.37 metric tons of carbon dioxide
per capita. In the case of the United States,
the average is 20.14, nearly 5 times as much. In
Africa, it is 1.17, while in Asia and Oceania it
is 2.87.
The ozone layer, in brief, protects us
from ultraviolet and heat radiation which
affects the immune system, sight, skin and life
of human beings. Under extreme conditions, the
destruction of that layer by human beings would
affect all forms of life on the planet.
Other problems, foreign to our nation
and many others under similar conditions, also
threaten us. A victorious counterrevolution
would spell a disaster for us, worse than
Indonesia's tragedy. Sukarno, overthrown in
1967, was a nationalist leader who, loyal to
Indonesia, headed the guerrillas who fought the
Japanese.
General Suharto, who overthrew him, had
been trained by Japanese occupation forces. At
the conclusion of World War II, Holland, a U.S.
ally, re-established control over that distant,
extensive and populated territory. Suharto
maneuvered. He hoisted the banners of U.S.
imperialism. He committed an atrocious act of
genocide. Today we know that, under instructions
from the CIA, he not only killed hundreds of
thousands but also imprisoned a million
communists and deprived them and their relatives
of all properties or rights; his family amassed
a fortune of 40 billion dollars —which, at
today's exchange rate, would be equivalent to
hundreds of billions— by handing over the
country's natural resources, the sweat of
Indonesians, to foreign investors. The West paid
up. Texan-born Lyndon B. Johnson, Kennedy's
successor, was then the President of the United
States.
The news on the events in Pakistan we
received today also attest to the dangers that
threaten our species: internal conflict in a
country that possesses nuclear weapons. This is
a consequence of the adventurous policies of and
the wars aimed at securing the world's natural
resources unleashed by the United States.
Pakistan, involved in a conflict it did
not unleash, faced the threat of being taken
back to the Stone Age.
The extraordinary circumstances faced
by Pakistan had an immediate effect on oil
prices and stock exchange shares. No country or
region in the world can disassociate itself from
the consequences. We must be prepared for
anything.
There hasn't been a day in my life in
which I haven't learned something.
Martí taught us that "all of the
world's glory fits in a kernel of corn". Many
times have I said and repeated this phrase,
which carries in eleven words a veritable school
of ethics.
Cuba's Five Heroes, imprisoned by the
empire, are to be held up as examples for the
new generations.
Fortunately, exemplary conducts will
continue to flourish with the consciousness of
our peoples as long as our species exists.
I am certain that many young Cubans, in
their struggle against the Giant in the
Seven-League Boots, would do as they did. Money
can buy everything save the soul of a people who
has never gone down on its knees.
I read the brief and concise report
which Raúl wrote and sent me. We must not waste
a minute as we continue to move forward. I will
raise my hand, next to you, to show my support.
Fidel Castro Ruz
December 27, 2007
8:35 p.m. |
