Cubans One and All: Today is May 20, Independence Day / Ignacio Estrada

Tomas Estrada Palma

With my little note I just want to remember those who wrote history bequeathing the Cuban nation a date that today unites Cubans inside and outside the island.

Independence Day is one of the many festivals they have tried to rip from the memory of our nation. Like they have also ripped from one of our capital’s main arteries the name of the person who was the first president of that fledgling republic, leaving only his shoes and an empty pedestal never occupied by any Cuban.

Palma's empty pedastel, only his shoes remain. Photo: Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo
Palma’s empty pedestal, only his shoes remain. Photo: Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo

Don Tomas Estrada Palma is a man worth remembering like those who drew their machetes for a May 20 that was entered into history as a day of glory. I know this date has been erased by those who have tried to show a history not told by our ancestors. The nascent Republic of 1902 is still worthy of being celebrated and is one of the indelible marks of our identity.

Blessed be they day of May 20, the birth date of our Republic of Cuba, island nation that jealously guards the key to the Gulf.

Today we have a Republic, today we have a Nation, today we have independence but our nation weeps to see the Cuban family disintegrate and see it abandoned to the whims of a few in olive-green who have been able to put themselves above all the interests of a group, that only cares for the throne and the perpetuation of its name.

20 May 2013