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By Vladimiro Roca Antunez. Posted on Thu, Jun. 27, 2002 in
The Miami Herald.
HAVANA -- The ''patriotic marches'' -- staged in Cuba to respond to
President Bush and demonstrate the people's ''support'' for both the Cuban
government and a referendum for constitutional reform filed by government
leaders -- constitute a dirty maneuver on the part of the regime to try to
legitimize its de facto government.
What's worse, the marches are an effort to swipe from the Cuban people the
right to exercise their sovereignty -- as recognized by Article 3 of the current
constitution. The article allows Cuban citizens to alter the constitution and
the laws to choose the political and economic systems that best suit their
needs.
BUSH, CARTER REBUFFED
The marches and government-sponsored petition should be seen as a rebuff to
Bush and the opposition's Varela Project -- and indirectly to ex-President Jimmy
Carter, who during his speech at the University of Havana supported that
project.
Aware of the strong support gained by the Varela Project -- a grass-roots
petition drive that seeks to bring about change in Cuba -- the Cuban government
took this road in an effort to dismiss the project. It was a disproportionate
response to a ''counterrevolutionary'' project, as the regime calls it, that
allegedly has no popular support.
The government urgently mobilized its forces to collect signatures that
would support its proposal for constitutional reform.
It would be good if the government answered these questions:
• Why did it attempt to prevent the collection of signatures for the
Varela Project if that plan has no popular support?
• Why did it allow the theft of Varela Project signatures when it
should have encouraged their collection to guarantee the right to sovereignty
recognized in the constitution?
• Why doesn't it publish the text of the Varela Project -- to inform
the people and comply with its own laws?
• Why does it try to keep the people from exercising the right to
sovereignty recognized in the constitution? Why does it try to eliminate that
right, claiming that the system is "untouchable''?
I posit here two other questions to which I offer answers:
• What does the Cuban government offer?
Discrimination between the native-born and the foreigner, when it comes to
participating in the nation's economy; the inequality of ordinary Cubans
vis--vis the leaders; the denial of the right of ownership to which Cubans are
entitled; and the infringement of the rights of association, freedom of
expression and other political, economic and social rights.
• What does the Varela Project offer? The confirmation of the right of
popular sovereignty; the right of ownership and participation in the nation's
economy according to the abilities and capabilities of every Cuban; the rights
of association and assembly and freedom of expression; and the right to enter
and leave the homeland freely, among other rights.
We Cubans must reject this crass maneuver by the government, thus preventing
the disastrous consequences that our support for it might bring.
With its referendum, the government seeks to close down Cuba's society even
more tightly. Its subtle intention is to provoke a popular uprising or an armed
intervention in our country that would justify the official speech about the
intentions of the enemy (read, the U.S. government) and relieve the Cuban
government from assuming its responsibility toward the people.
Noted Cuban dissident Vladimiro Roca Antúnez was recently freed
from prison after serving nearly five years on charges of sedition. | 
