PRESS RELEASE
Why the Orlando Zapata Tamayo National Civic Resistance Front Will Not Meet with Obama
Orlando Zapata Tamayo National Civic Resistance Front
Published on Facebook by Rolando Rodríguez Lobaina
March 3, 2016

The Cuban Communist Party bulletin, Granma, claims that Obama's visit to the island dismantles the myth that human rights are violated in Cuba, and that Obama will see in Cuba that the values of freedom of expression, assembly, and religion are exercised by the people.

Obama adviser Ben Rhodes made several points to justify Obama's visit to Cuba, including: the old U.S. policy with Cuba did not change the situation of the island; negotiations between the two countries have allowed more American tourists to travel to the island and facilitated trade; and that as part of the agreements the Cuban regime has allowed more Cubans to access the Internet and will continue to expand infrastructure so that Cubans can access more information.

Some television stations in the U.S., for example Channel 23 in Miami, have posted a video of Cubans in Havana saying that Obama's visit in March will improve the lives of citizens, with the hope that Cuba’s internal problems of misery and insecurity will be resolved by another nation.

Another segment of Cuban civil society supports the visit in the hope that it will empower ordinary citizens and enable them to break free from the paternalistic state, allowing Cuban identity to flourish, among other things. In short, all are arguments based on hopes for the future as opposed to realities of the present.

Ben Rhodes also claims that the future appears bright for the U.S. in the hemisphere, referring to Obama's visit to Cuba.

All of the reasons given in the national and international media to support the restoration of relations between Washington and Havana as well as Obama's visit to Cuba are based on claims about the future which conflict with the agenda of the regime itself, which has not acquiesced to a single demand of the internal opposition, beginning with respect for human rights.

The Orlando Zapata Tamayo National Civic Resistance Front believes that Obama's visit to the island is illegitimate in terms of ethics, morals, and the sovereignty of our own people. Nonetheless, we understand the wishes of many of our compatriots, known for their struggle for a fully free Cuba throughout half a century of totalitarian domination.

Obama believes it is his prerogative to define what is good and best for our people, but the experience of all these years, the countless arrests, prison, the thousands of hours in which we came to know the cruel face of the military and the intolerant and arrogant policies of the Castro brothers against their opponents, enable us to assert that the regime will never allow any change induced from outside, nor recognize the Cuban opposition.

More than another attempt to fix Cuba’s internal problems, Washington needs a plan to control immigration of Cubans to the U.S., in addition to Havana’s cooperation in dismantling the hemisphere’s historic anti-Americanism (promoted by the Castro communist regime itself) in order to restore balance following Russian and Chinese intrusion in the region’s economic and military sectors.

Meanwhile, Havana has taken the measure of America’s desperation to restore relations and demanded that tough U.S. policies against the regime be softened to allow air into the domestic economy, with the control at all times of the Cuban military monopoly. For its part, Havana would never extend such courtesy to emerging businesses which, like beggars, try to cope at great disadvantage with the rigors of state inspections and arbitrary rules imposed on a whim from a position of power.

From the beginning, talks between the two countries have been welcomed by Canada and the Vatican, even planned and agreed through them. Now everyone happily embraces the oppressive and bloody regime in Cuba, as if there were a blank slate. The people do not count; the opposition which represents the people does not count. Neither counted for anything, even in a context where there were many differing opinions. Nor can the Front ignore that economic and strategic interests figure prominently, perhaps even more than political interests. From a comfortable position, Obama's own cabinet as well as certain elements in the resistance advocate for the change that will benefit them in a post-Castro Cuba.

No U.S. president of the Castro era has made the Cuban people go hungry, destroyed the streets of Cuba, failed to build and repair homes, caused tens of thousands of deaths in the Florida Straits, caused thousands of deaths in the island’s prisons, or executed Cuban patriots in their struggle for freedom. The Castro regime is the worst thing to happen to Cuba in its history.

We still have our own identity distinct from that of the U.S., which has been a friend to democracy in the world and a friend to the Cuban people. We still have the green palms of our countryside, the thought and work of Martí, Luz y Caballero, and Varela. We still have the nobility of Maceo.

 We cannot meet with Obama when, by stepping foot in our country and shaking the bloody hand of the tyrant, he insults those fallen in the many years of fighting for liberation, and when--even assuming good intentions in the desire to narrow the gap between the countries--the president of the most powerful nation on Earth gives the regime in Havana yet another advantage against the Cuban opposition, with incalculable negative consequences to the struggle for a just, secure, and democratic future in our homeland.

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