By Atty. E. Javier Hernández H.
Validating the principle of “bad economic base, bad superstructure,” parallel to the inefficient economic management, the functioning of the State organs of administration is also flawed at all levels, flawed and ineffective.
For years a vicious circle has been created in the occupation of key positions to manage the economy and other sectors of society, for individuals with the gifts of “reliability,” not talent, so that when they finished their duties they transferred to another agency, taking with them mediocrity, immobility and inability.
But there is something worse in the functionaries, that damages and create prejudices; it is the impunity of their fault, as there is no legal and moral will to make those mid-level and high officials pay for their bad decisions, bad solutions, worst omissions. It is most humiliating in a State that proclaims rights and equality to see people dodging and avoiding the weight of law and justice, which are well defined and regulated in all procedures for the law, including the courts, which apparently treat senior cadres and leaders of the State or their families differently.
In Cuba there are Decrees-Laws 196 and 197 since 1999 (they state the Cuban legal standard for how, when and why, and not the bosses), as amended by a few articles in Decree-Law No. 251 of August 1, 2007, essentially adding administrative discipline violations having to do with the alleged ambiguity of the decree, when it included the responsibility of leaders and officials for negligence, inaction, prevention; that is, the so-called “collateral” responsibility for the acts of their subordinates.
There is also Article 26 of the Constitution of the Republic of Cuba, “… Any person who suffers damages or prejudices unjustly caused by functionaries or agents of the State with the motive to exercise the proper duties of his charges, has the right to claim and obtain the corresponding indemnification as prescribed by law …”
In most cases, these characters have double responsibility, and double immunity, which translates for almost all into double passivity, double immobility, double servitude, to ensure a corresponding double privilege, although Article 82 of the Constitution states …. The status of deputy does not entail personal privileges or economic benefits.
Now, what happens in practice? Because the famous “collateral measures” always work at the level of directors of businesses, or leaders and functionaries of the Establishments or Organizational Units of the Base, what’s more they reach municipal directors.
In the recent cases of corruption in the country, both political and economic, the most renowned, from the General Acevedo, foreign firms, Ministers, Deputy Ministers, passing through the recognized failures of the Communist Congresses, we might ask … when will blame the “collaterals from above,” who are the chiefs of those chiefs to remove or punish them.
But unfortunately I also remember the in Cuban Constitution itself an innovation of 1976… Article 83. No deputy to the National Assembly of People’s Power may be arrested or criminally prosecuted without the authorization of the Assembly or the Council of State if it is not in session, except in cases of flagrant malfeasance … “
One would hope for justice in Cuba that all are truly equal before the law; that are People’s Courts cannot be manipulated, and are impartial and fair as the citizens expect, for workers, subordinates, those undefended find protection for their rights, their longings, and their hopes.
July 18 2012
