It is Irresponsible to Offer Hope

A shared question: How much longer do we have to wait? (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, 29 June 2021 — The Cubans who inhabit the island receive hope from two sources. From the spheres of power they assure them that everything is under control, that the difficulties are transitory and that the country will not only come to the fore, but that it has not renounced development. On the other hand, it is announced that the end is near and it is almost proclaimed that the present generation will experience the transition to democracy.

The new forecasts on daily life issued by the official media are signs that the dynamics of deterioration no longer comes from stagnation but from regression. The need to present the ration book to buy groceries and cleaning products in stores not governed by the rationing system is just a sign. The fact that in Cuba it is difficult to acquire rum, cigars and coffee is evidence. Not to mention sugar, pork, or beer.

The symptoms of the disaster that foresee a collapse are manifested in the insolent repression that doesn’t hesitate to arrest an artist like Hamlet Lavastida, perhaps as a defiant response to the warnings of the European Parliament or as a demonstration of the fear they have of the new opposition currents.

It is not the first time that the country’s economic figures have hit rock bottom, nor is it the first time that the bosses have come under the pressure of sanctions. Nor is it new that the compulsion to emigrate finds new shortcuts as irrefutable proof of discontent. But neither is the spark lit to detonate the social explosion, nor do the differences in high places indicate that a fracture is approaching.

Neither the resurrection nor the final collapse are seen on the horizon of events. Every time I hear people say that “hope is the last thing to be lost,” I wonder if perhaps, because we have lost everything, we only have the last resort of hope.

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