SAN LUIS POTOSÍ, Mexico.- Mirdael Matos Gainza, a Cuban dissident member of the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU), resident in the municipality of Maisí, Guantánamo, was arrested This Friday, September 13, his wife confirmed to CubaNet.
The activist was arrested without any explanation. However, according to the wife’s statement, the police have been stalking him in an attempt to implicate him in a crime he did not commit.
After his apprehensionwas taken to a police unit known as “La Máquina” but officers will transfer him to the Guantanamo prison, Matos Gainza’s wife was told.
The Cuban opposition member collaborates with independent media and frequently makes videos and interviews in his community about the situation in which they live.
He has protested in Guantanamo against the arbitrary actions of the authorities, who have blamed him for anti-government posters that appear in his area of residence.
Between March and April 2021, the activist went on a hunger strike to demand an end to the police siege against UNPACU.
Years ago, it had been accused of the crime of attack and they asked for three years of deprivation of liberty.
State Security systematically threatens and detains those who oppose the Castro system. The harassment even extends to the children of activists.
Frequent harassment
Mirdael Matos himself denounced that the authorities of Guantánamo province have put obstacles in the way of his daughters’ ability to study.
During the coronavirus pandemic, they hindered the incorporation of young girls into education in exchange for the father giving up his activism at UNPACU.
“One of my daughters missed a year and a half due to COVID-19 problems and decided to go back to school; where there is no school, there is nothing. My other daughter was given a technical degree in agronomy and she did not agree and they agreed to get her a Pre-Pedagogical in the province of Guantánamo,” she told DNA Cuba Matos Gainza years ago.
State Security agents in the province pressured their daughters to give up activism in exchange for studying.
“They promise them that they will get their studies and we are at this point where everyone has started the course and they are waiting for the lies that they are fed every day. They promise my daughters and in the end they don’t get anything,” she added.
