Castro’s exit, a reflection

As a young idealist, one of the earliest books I read was Castro’s magnum opus, History Will Absolve Me. It is one testament I have kept tab with for inspiration and one that I have tapped into from time to time. Idealistic as it was, it demonstrated the zeal and passion that drove a group of young revolutionaries to change the course of history. Living in an era where wealth is the measure of valour and social relevance, here is one account of a group of young people united by their rejection of wanton materialism and a search for a credible alternative for the common good. Two similar publications measure up to its fervour in my world, Ernesto Che Guevara Speaks and the Autobiography of Malcolm X. Collectively these works remind that popular revolutions are still desirable in societies where capitalism and its sale of phantom freedom and decadence have created mass poverty on one hand and wanton wealth for a few. 

 

The selfless style of leadership exhibited by the leaders of the 1959 Cuban Revolution proves that selfless leadership is attainable for governance to have a meaningful impact. Author James Baldwin might have paraphrased it as this, that man must be propelled to lead by stubbornness even if that stubbornness sometimes proves idiotic.

 

Fidel, the son of a bourgeois landowner refused to gobble down the inheritance that would have been his, preferring instead to sacrifice personal gain for the common good. With uncommon zeal, almost bare hands and dogged determination, they rose against tanks, guns and bayonets of a puppet regime propelled by the gods of money. They succeeded at great deprivation and established an ideal society as it were, an alternative to the one that created gross inequality convinced that even death has an alternative. For their daring, they faced unprecedented blockade, to such an extent that those who visited Cuba in the last three decades described its city scenes as a 60s movie set transformed into a way of life.

 

That Cuba survived for so long in spite of the gang-up against it and the overt and covert efforts of big political bullies is not because of the totalitarianism of the revolutionaries as often touted in the decadent western media; it was the support from the people; pride of the citizenry in their nation and absolute trust in its political leadership to act in its overall best interest. The inherent contradictions in capitalism and the global turmoil it keeps plunging the world underscores the need to seek for an alternate way today as it was necessary in 1959 and that every society has a right to decide its own course.

 

While battling the blockade, Castro’s Cuba managed to keep its fleet of now classic ramshackle vehicles moving, and a semblance of public transport system that works; its people continued to feed themselves via its agrarian revolution, the schools continued to run, raising some of the best doctors who have served in the remotest corners of the globe where they are needed. Its fighters fought shoulder to shoulder against oppressive regimes helping to bring down apartheid; its non-aligned posture kept the warmongers from unleashing pure hell on whomever they felt was working against their capitalist interests.

 

Castro, a fiery speaker took the back seat for the past decade, leaving governance in the hands of his brother Raul who evidently is Cuba’s own Mikhail Gorbachev gradually dismantling the last vestiges of totalitarianism and injecting much-needed doses of perestroika and glasnost. Cuba stood on still on Friday night and reflective leaders across the globe carefully chose their words as they mourned the passage of an icon and an enigma. Of a truth, history would absolve Castro as a man who came, saw and did what he felt was needed needed to deliver an independent island nation from the clutches of economic vultures. He had the courage to stand by his convictions.

With his passage, scavengers are standing bye to pounce on his nation and to turn it into a basket case while absolving themselves of their greed and blaming it all on the revolutionaries. The Miami voltrons are gearing up for the kill, God help the poor people of Cuba. As for Castro, he came and played well his part defiantly shouting – Patria o muerte, Vinceremos! Adios commandante Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz. Viva la revolucion! Viva!

 

ERRATA

Reader Abubakar Atiku wrote to say: “the incidence of kidnapping of Ambassador Bagudu Hirse you referred to in last week’s edition of your column happened at the residence of the all powerful uncle of PMB, Alh. Mamman Daura and NOT Lawal Daura, the DG, DSS’’. 

 

The mix-up is entirely my fault; is hereby corrected with regrets. Thank you.