Havana Cuba. — This Friday, an excellent chronicle dated in our capital and published in this same digital newspaper, recalls Vampires in Havana and the saga of the mambí Elpidio Valdés. The author —anonymous, unfortunately— recalls the unfortunate death, three years ago, of its brilliant author Juan Padrón.
In a paragraph worth repeating, the chronicler highlights the undoubted merits of the likeable character: “Without ideological biases or manipulations, Elpidio Valdés vindicated Cuban identity, love for freedom and respect for heroes in a more effective way than any rant or speech”. Padrón—I think—achieved a true intellectual feat: creating material that is anti-colonialist, but not anti-Spanish.
During my tenure years, as an involuntary tenant on the inhospitable islands of the “DGP Archipelago” (General Directorate of Prisons) Castro, I had the opportunity to verify the extraordinary interest that the saga of the mambí colonel aroused in that highly problematic public. And for the record that I am talking about the common prisoners that the Castro jailers made us our companions in misfortune.
It happened that these thieves, murderers or rapists not only began to watch without fail the episodes created by Padrón every time they were put on television. It is that they already knew them by heart, and while the adventure was taking place, they repeated in a low voice the dialogues that the various characters of the series were holding among themselves.
But behold, the fateful Castroism intervened in the matter. We are talking about a kind of King Midas, only with the opposite sign. If the original monarch in Greek myth turned everything he touched into gold, his rude impersonator in today’s Cuban tragedy turns everything he puts his dirty hands on into excrement.
It is the case that, given the popularity of the episodes, some doctrinaire bureaucrat from the shadowy Ideological Department, in the Central Committee of the only party, came up with a bizarre idea: to make a feature film in which the mambí colonel, in alliance with determined Spaniards, faced the Yankees! It was thus that a disgusting and unhistorical mess arose: “Elpidio Valdés against dollar and cannon”.
Of course I deplore Juan Padrón for having lent his talent, his pen and the endearing characters of his authorship for that filthy thing; that he has given in to communist blackmail. But, for me, that is where his responsibility for that repulsive manipulation ends. I don’t think it’s fair to attribute all the blame to him for a scam whose true creators are other people.
It has wanted the chance that, also this Friday, CubaNet has published the news of some statements made by a prominent anti-Castro against the electoral farce that the Havana regime has organized for the coming Sunday. This time it is Dr. Orlando Gutiérrez-Boronat, coordinator of the Assembly of the Cuban Resistance (ARC).
The leader of the Exile made his call in Montecristi, Dominican Republic, a memorable city for us Cubans. As will be remembered, it was there that, in 1895, the political and military leaders of the War of Independence —José Martí and Máximo Gómez— signed the manifesto in which they proclaimed, before the Cubans and international public opinion, the purposes of that war. new emancipatory campaign.
The informative note recalls a great truth: that what our heroes aspired to establish was “a country of free men and women that would prosper due to the hard work and intelligence of Cubans.” As any objective observer can appreciate, it is exactly the opposite of what, to the misfortune of our country, atheistic and foreignizing communism has enthroned in it.
During these last weeks there have been calls from opponents and independent journalists not to go to the polling stations on Sunday the 26th. Substantive arguments have been put forward for this: the stinking swamp into which Castroism has plunged Cuba, the economic catastrophe, unsustainable inflation, the unstoppable emigration of young people and those who are not, the gloomy threats of “Continuity”…
But, beyond the political arguments, this time I would like to return to the late Juan Padrón. I refer to the deplorable anecdote of having given in to Castro’s approaches and having lent himself to perpetrating Elpido Valdés against dollar and cannon. If we recognize that as an unfortunate surrender that tarnishes the value of his work, then it is fair and necessary that ordinary Cubans avoid imitating him.
I ask these people for a simple act: that they not give in to Castro’s blackmail. I already pointed out that this regimen turns everything it touches into excrement. The so-called “elections of deputies” are no more than another facet of that. It would be a contradiction for a decent and dignified Cuban who disagrees with what is happening in his country, to lend his name and his face to validate that sanctimonious thing. Why would he or she stick their hands in that filthy dunghill!
OPINION ARTICLE
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