HAVANA, January 11 (Amarilis Cortina Rey, Cuba-Verdad / www.cubanet.org) -
Harold Domínguez González, 13, refused to express an opinion on
the internationalist policies of the Cuban government or on the scholarships
granted to foreigners to study in Cuba, and his teacher failed him in a Spanish
test.
Harold is an eighth-grade student at the Socialist Republic of Vietnam
middle school, in Havana.
At a subsequent meeting, January 8, the school’s principal criticized
Harold and told his mother, Elena González, that he would not pass the
grade if he did not express favorable opinions about the Cuban political system.
Harold has obtained excellent grades in other subjects, in which questions
about politics don’t come up.
Education Ministry officials have said repeatedly that ideological training
is one of the fundamental goals of the system, and the Minister of Higher
Education, Fernando Vecino Alegret, has said several times that "the
university is for the revolutionaries," meaning those who agree with and
participate in the government.
Harold’s father, Carlos Alberto Domínguez, is a human rights
activist and an independent journalist. The couple, along with their three minor
children, have had visas to go to the United States as political refugees, but
the Interior Ministry has not issued the necessary exit visas. About that, a
Major Castillo, an Emigration Department officer, said the visas have not been
issued "for the family’s own good."
Versión
original en español
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