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Ricardo Gonzalez Alfonso. Posted on Thu, Apr. 18, 2002 in
The Miami Herald.
These are excerpts from a written interview with Cuban activist Vladimiro
Roca, a member of the Internal Dissidence Working Group, who has been in prison
since July 16, 1997, for helping draft a manifesto for a peaceful change to
democracy, titled The
Homeland Belongs to Us All. He was charged with sedition.
The questions, from independent journalist Ricardo González Alfonso,
were smuggled into Ariza Prison by anonymous sympathizers. Roca's answers were
similarly smuggled out.
Roca, 59, the son of Cuban Communist Party cofounder Blas Roca Calderío,
is president of the Social Democratic Party (considered illegal in Cuba) and the
most famous Cuban to break with Fidel Castro's regime and join the dissident
movement.
• Why do you believe the Cuban government keeps you in prison and
doesn't release you on parole?
Anything I might say about the reasons why I wasn't granted parole would be
merely speculation. I can state only the following: I was given the maximum
sentence [five years] and sent to the Ariza Prison. Here I spent two years, five
months and 17 days in solitary confinement. When I asked a major from State
Security why, he told me: "Let's say it was by mistake.''
I think that this question should be answered by the pertinent authorities.
• Describe the prison conditions and how you spend your time.
I am in a cubicle about 10 meters long by two meters wide. Seven meters are
set aside for the dormitory (three bunk beds); three meters for the service area
(latrine and kitchen), very humid, like the cells.
Two of us live here now, although last year there were six of us.
My basic activities during the day are: prayer, clean-up and reading. I read
everything that falls into my hands that either interests me or provides
spiritual improvement.
I go out in the sun two or three times a month. I watch television two or
three times a week, almost always a newscast and occasionally a movie.
• Has prison changed you from a human and political point of view?
It's impossible for someone to go through prison and not change his way of
acting or thinking. What needs to be specified is in what direction: for good or
for bad? It's an extraordinary experience.
Politically speaking, imprisonment has strengthened my convictions about the
justice of my struggle to achieve democratic changes in Cuba. In prison, one
gets to know in depth the system's injustice and true measure.
On the human side, my faith in God has increased. He has opened my eyes to
the struggle that we must wage to change the material and spiritual conditions
of prison life. This element must be incorporated into the struggle for
democratic changes.
• What has been your toughest day in prison? If you had a happy day,
when was it and why?
My toughest day was Nov. 19, 1997, when I walked into isolation cell No. 23.
The place didn't look like a cell; it resembled a cage meant to hold wild
animals.
I found myself in a narrow, dirty and foul-smelling cell. My only belongings
were a towel, my Bible, two handkerchiefs, two pairs of shorts, a bar of facial
soap, a bar of laundry soap, a tube of toothpaste, two shorts, two sleeveless
shirts, a bedsheet, a bed-mat made of cane and a futon covered with burlap, both
crawling with bedbugs.
I really didn't think I could stand it for long. However, I prayed to God
for help -- and here I am, two years and almost six months in solitary and about
to complete my entire sentence.
My happiest day was Sept. 24, 1999, day of Our Lady of Mercy, patron saint
of prisoners, when I received the Sacrament of Baptism.
• During your childhood, you were given an atheistic education, but as
an adult you converted to Catholicism. What experiences brought about that
change?
I wouldn't say that I was given an atheistic education. Although my father
was not a believer, he respected everyone else's beliefs. He also taught me that
to deny God's existence, one must have irrefutable evidence -- and I didn't have
that.
The experiences that brought about the change were, first, the search for
love, as opposed to the politics of hatred promoted by the Cuban government.
That search led me to find Christ and discover that He is the greatest
expression of love.
In making an appraisal of my life, I realized how often God had joined me in
my path, helping me and saving my life on three occasions. I began to study the
Bible and absorb the teachings of Christ.
• What are your first and last remembrances of your father? Have those
experiences influenced your present life in prison?
I can tell you what remembrance of my father most easily comes to my mind.
One time, I returned home speaking ill of a person. When my father heard me,
he asked me why I spoke that way, and I answered that I was repeating what a
friend had told me.
My father said that before expressing an opinion about someone, I had to be
sure of what I was saying and not allow myself to be swayed by what others had
said, otherwise I'd be a puppet of someone else's opinion.
He told me to do research and to analyze and shape my own ideas and defend
them until someone else proved me wrong.
I most often recall the time the Civil Code was approved. I read it and told
my father that it was useless because it contained many incongruences regarding
the right of ownership and the relationship between private individuals and
state enterprises. I said that no one could understand the code for it was so
strange and complex.
He replied: "The Civil Code and the current laws have many faults,
true, but we had to replace the old 19th Century Code because it didn't apply to
the new conditions. The current laws contain elements that will allow those who
come behind us to improve them.''
Both remembrances have influenced the decisions I've made. They help me a
great deal now, and they always will influence my life. | 
