How Many Dead Do You Need?

Colonel Mario Méndez, a high-ranking official from the Ministry of the Interior, who repeated on national television, blaming the United States for the Bahia Honda tragedy, “how many more deaths are needed.” (Capture)

14ymedio biggerAlexis Romay, New Jersey, 4 November 2022

How many dead do you need?
How many more people killed
by a government so skilled
in implementing its creed
that after it does the deed
of sinking a fleeing boat
it accuses the scapegoat?
Cuba is a dictatorship. 
Spare me photos from your trip.
My friends in Cuba can’t vote.
________
Author’s note: This is my recreation and condensation, in English, of my décimas published this week in the Spanish edition of 14ymedio.

Colonel Mario Méndez, a high-ranking officer of the Ministry of Interior, gave me the fuel for this text with the question that he repeated ad nauseam during a TV program apropos of the latest massacre perpetrated by the Cuban regime: “How many more dead do you need?”

Please, keep in mind that this post —as well as the entirety of Ideological Deviation, my weekly column— is considered a crime by the Cuban government.
 

____________

COLLABORATE WITH OUR WORK: The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by becoming a member of 14ymedio now. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.