December 15, 1997, in the Miami Herald
SOREN TRIFF
WE REAFFIRM what isn't firm; we prop up what might fall down.
The recent March of Patriotic Reaffirmation was a beautiful civic act, but it also was a political signal of fear of the future, because it was blind to the other march that Cuban exiles stage every day, sending all kinds of assistance to dismantle the totalitarian regime.
The march should have been dedicated exclusively to the political prisoners, especially the authors of the June document The Homeland Belongs to Everyone, the initiators of nonviolent, political struggle:
Vladimiro Roca, Felix Bonne Carcasses, Rene Gomez Manzano, and Marta Beatriz Roque Cabello.
One of the parade's elements was divisive and unacceptable: the condemnation of the cruise to Cuba during the pope's visit. The organizers repudiated any contact with the Cuban people, fearing that others might think that Fidel Castro no longer has any opponents. They could have made a different interpretation. They could have stated that the exile community is so sure of itself and of the triumph of its beliefs that it does not fear returning to Cuba to support the islanders, to tell them that they're not alone, and that we are one people.
One segment of the traditional exile community fears contact with Cuba because any contact means surrender, the abdication of one's principles, playing the dictator's game. Rather than make contact with a "communist,'' they would walk off the field.
In fact, every time that we reject contact, we abandon people to the dictator.
I am particularly troubled by the fact that the Cuban American National Foundation swung at this "low ball.'' The late Jorge Mas Canosa was noted for not replying to attacks from fellow exiles and for not encouraging divisive behavior. I know the importance of his role between the foundation's reactionary directors and their liberal counterparts.
I fear that foundation directors with obsolete ideas might get the upper hand now that the organization doesn't have a visionary of Mas Canosa's caliber.
The foundation should not discard the trump card that served Mas Canosa so well: the ability to correct its course at all times, according to circumstances, always for the good of Cuba.
The foundation's best moments have been of a centrist nature: the Exodus program, the meeting with Jesse Jackson, its support for President Clinton, its opposition to Wayne Smith [who advocates better U.S.-Cuba relations], and—most important of all—Mas Canosa's televised debate with Cuban Na- tional Assembly President Ricardo Alarcon.
Some of these stances were unpopular among the obsolete thinkers who organized the march. To them, Mas Canosa was never steadfast enough, intransigent enough. He never leaned far enough to the right. But Mas Canosa was courageous enough to step away from the Republicans when it became necessary, and from the obsolete right-wingers when it became appropriate.
I am going to miss that courage in the foundation. Particularly now that Cuban exiles need visionary leaders with organization and money to carry its ideas a step farther.
Thanks to the struggle for human rights, political lobbying, humanitarian flotillas of planes and ships, aid to relatives, and visits and phone calls to Cuba, today we have a small-but-solid political opposition and an embryonic civil society standing up to totalitarianism. But that's not enough. We need to open more social cracks in the wall of the dictatorship so that political defiance may flow more freely.
International aid to the Catholic Church, for example, has enabled thousands of the faithful to gather on the streets for the first time. This, in turn, allows Cardinal Jaime Ortega to make ever-more-daring social comments.
The march of love toward Cuba has begun. It is led by individual who seek no limelight, by organizations that are weak and short of money. But no one dares to invite full participation of the exile community. No one dares to explain that the transition to democracy in Cuba cannot be left to unscrupulous governments and financial interests, and that all roads lead to a strong Cuban society.
Who will invite the traditional exile to walk in this new march?
Copyright © 1997 The Miami Herald