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CUBA
NEWS
The
Miami Herald
Foe back in Cuba to oppose Castro
Says he'll work for 'peace and reconciliation'
By Luisa Yanez, Oscar Corral and
Adriana Cordovi. Lyanez@herald.com. Posted on
Fri, Aug. 08, 2003
Former Cuban political prisoner and rebel leader
Eloy Gutiérrez-Menoyo, who has lived in
Miami for the past 17 years, announced in Havana
on Thursday that he has decided to remain in Cuba
to live so he can launch an internal opposition
movement.
Gutiérrez-Menoyo made his announcement
as he and his family, who were visiting Havana,
prepared to board a return flight to Miami. It
comes five months after the government of Fidel
Castro cracked down on the island's dissident
movement, sending dozens to prison.
There was no immediate response from the Cuban
government. Gutiérrez-Menoyo, 68, who was
once one of Castro's trusted rebel leaders in
the early days of the revolution but later split
with the Cuban leader, was born in Madrid and
is a Cuban citizen. He has permanent U.S. residency.
Gutiérrez-Menoyo was a cofounder of Alpha
66, the exile community's first paramilitary group,
in the early 1960s. He was captured in Cuba in
early 1965 and spent 22 years as a political prisoner.
Gutiérrez-Menoyo now heads the more centrist
group Cambio Cubano, which promotes dialogue with
Cuba. He told reporters at Havana's José
Martí International Airport he was ending
his exile in Miami to work toward a peaceful transition
in Cuba.
''I'm publicly declaring my right to stay in
Cuban territory,'' he said.
FOUR-PAGE MANIFESTO
Armed with a four-page manifesto titled ''Message
to all Cubans for a New Revolution,'' Gutiérrez-Menoyo
said: "I come to work for an open agenda
in favor of peace and the reconciliation of all
Cubans.''
In the manifesto, he explained his actions:
''My decision to not go back to exile and instead
settle in Cuba definitely comes as direct result
of a careful and profound analysis of the country's
situation and from an understanding that I can
be more useful here than abroad,'' he said in
the document. He added that no government was
''manipulating'' him.
His wife, Gladys, and three school-age sons boarded
the plane for Miami International Airport without
him. On arrival they were met by reporters Thursday
morning.
''I support my husband 100 percent,'' Gladys
Gutiérrez-Menoyo said.
Later, at a press conference at the couple's
southwest Miami-Dade home, Gladys Gutiérrez-Menoyo
tearfully told reporters that she learned of her
husband's intention to remain in Cuba at the last
minute at the airport, where it was not unusual
for reporters to interview him as he left the
island.
''I found out when he was telling them. I was
shocked,'' she said in her living room, flanked
by her three sons, Carlos, 13, Alex, 11, and Miguel,
9. The family had flown to Cuba for a 17-day getaway.
In a prepared statement, she urged Miami exiles
to support her husband.
''Do not be fooled. This is a very serious step
he has taken. A risky decision made in the middle
of much tension in Havana,'' the statement said.
She said her husband did not discuss his decision
with anyone -- including the Cuban government.
She said her husband has always sought ''legal
opposition space'' on the island.
Gutiérrez-Menoyo's daughter, Patricia,
said in a phone interview from Puerto Rico that
she too was shocked by her father's decision.
She feared he may now face prison in Cuba again.
''This time he goes with more powerful weapons
than back then,'' she said. "Moral values,
ethics, and a desire for peace and reconciliation.
He knew how to make war when it was time. Now
years later, with greater maturity, he firmly
believes that peaceful means are required.''
But some Miami exiles have long considered Gutiérrez-Menoyo
to be soft on Castro. His organization is seen
as far more left of center than the majority of
exile groups, most of which oppose any dialogue
or contact with Castro's government.
After breaking rank with Castro, Gutiérrez-Menoyo
lived in Miami, where he became the military leader
of Alpha 66.
In late 1964, he landed in Cuba with three men
in hopes of launching an armed uprising. But he
was captured and sentenced to death. The sentence
was later commuted to 30 years. In 1986, after
22 years, the Cuban government released him, honoring
a request from Spain's prime minister at the time,
Felipe González.
Gutiérrez-Menoyo lived in Spain for a
while, but eventually resettled in Miami.
His lukewarm relationship with the more hard-line
members of the Cuban exile community prompted
some to look at his bold move Thursday with suspicion
and disdain, though others called him a patriot.
''I'm very disappointed with Menoyo,'' said Huber
Matos, another fellow rebel leader who followed
Castro and was imprisoned for 20 years after criticizing
the Cuban leader. "He is not the man he used
to be. To me, he is allowing himself to be used
by Fidel to make it look to the world that the
opposition is allowed to exist in Cuba, while
we know that those who oppose the government are
punished.''
Ernesto Díaz, who founded the paramilitary
group Alpha 66 in 1961 with Gutiérrez-Menoyo
and later served several years in a Cuban prison
with him, said he and Gutiérrez-Menoyo
parted company in 1993 when Gutiérrez-Menoyo
started talking about dialogue with the Cuban
government.
''I respect his decision,'' Díaz said.
"But to go to Cuba and place yourself in
the government's hands is ineffective. I think
he is losing much politically, and his prestige
as a revolutionary warrior.''
Other prominent Cuban exiles received the news
of Gutiérrez-Menoyo's maneuver with skepticism
and caution.
''Menoyo has many faces,'' said José Basulto,
founder of Brothers to the Rescue. "I don't
see him as opposition, but as someone who collaborates
with Castro.''
Joe Garcia, executive director of the Cuban American
National Foundation, said Gutiérrez-Menoyo
had to ''beg'' to return to his country, where
he ironically helped bring about the government
that is there today.
''Menoyo has very few friends,'' Garcia said.
MORE SUPPORTIVE
Others were more supportive. Alfredo Durán,
secretary of the Cuban Committee for Democracy,
an exile group opposed to the U.S. embargo of
Cuba, said Gutiérrez-Menoyo has always
wanted to open an office in Havana for Cambio
Cubano.
''He is a Cuban patriot, as he always has been,''
Durán said. "You have to take your
hat off to his courage. He is there nonviolently
and simply wants to exercise his civil rights
and to live in his country.''
In Cuba, the reaction was also mixed. Some dissidents
welcomed Gutiérrez-Menoyo's entry into
their ranks, while others were skeptical.
''This is a cause for many Cubans. Even though
he's not a Cuban, his love of this country has
been proven,'' Cuba's best-known opposition leader,
Oswaldo Payá, said in a telephone interview
Thursday.
Like Gutiérrez-Menoyo, Payá is
fighting for the right for all Cubans to be allowed
to come and go from their homeland when they wish.
''But dissident work has been going on. This
is not something that starts now,'' Payá
said. "There are many who have already been
working for this on the island.''
Another well-known dissident, Vladimiro Roca,
the son of a longtime Communist Party leader,
said in a phone interview from Havana that Gutiérrez-Menoyo
has never reached out to him during his many visits
to the island.
''We don't know his intentions,'' Roca said.
"If he's going to be allowed to stay here
and form an opposition group, that is something
that had to be approved in the highest levels,
probably even by Fidel.''
Herald translator Renato Perez and the Associated
Press contributed to this report.
Leap of fate
From U.S. to Cuba and back, triple jumper
beats odds
By Kevin Baxter. Kbaxter@herald.com.
Posted on Fri, Aug. 08, 2003.
SANTO DOMINGO - Cuban government officials gave
Yuliana Pérez a choice: She could compete
in the Olympics or keep her U.S. citizenship.
But she couldn't have both.
Looks like they were wrong.
Three years after leaving Cuba for the United
States with no friends, family or even a rudimentary
understanding of English to help her, Pérez
has a college degree and three national triple
jump titles.
Tonight, she goes for another crown in the Pan
American Games, and to win she'll have to beat
favorite Yamilé Aldama, who she was once
being trained to replace on the Cuban national
team.
''Everything in life is a risk,'' Pérez
said. "And we all have to go through all
that. [But] the Lord was with me. That's why I'm
here. I'm doing just fine. I'm happy.''
Born in Tucson to Cuban exiles who left the island
during the Mariel boatlift, Pérez was orphaned
at 3 when her mother, Osmayda Pérez, was
killed in a drive-by shooting in San Diego. José
Carlos Martínez, the father she never knew,
was in a Georgia prison.
So after bouncing from foster home to foster
home, Pérez was sent to Cuba to live with
relatives who didn't want her.
As a teen, she showed a talent for track, winning
the Cuban national junior title in the triple
jump as well as a silver in the 1997 Junior Pan
American Games in Havana. That earned her a spot
in the Giraldo Córdoba Cardín school,
an elite academic and athletic training ground
sponsored by the government, as well as a place
on the Cuban national team.
A year later her two dreams -- an education and
a spot on the Olympic team -- seemed within reach.
But then the government added a catch: Before
she could leave the island to compete, she had
to renounce her U.S. citizenship.
''And I said no,'' Pérez, 22, said. "They
just touched the right part. They knew that my
dream has always been to go to the Olympics. They
thought I might say yes. But they got that wrong.
"My parents risked their own lives for me,
to give me [that] citizenship.''
And that was more important than a gold medal.
Within days, she was kicked out of school and
off the national team. Old friends suddenly stopped
coming around, and the possibility of getting
a decent job seemed out of the question.
''I wanted to do something,'' she said. "At
least get an education.''
So she decided to do the one thing she had never
even considered before: She decided to leave Cuba.
''If I would have been able to compete for the
Cuban team, honestly, I would have stayed,'' she
said. "Because my family's there. And I would
have competed for Cuba. I could have left whenever
I wanted to. I'm a U.S. citizen.''
With a yellow backpack full of clothes, $800
and the address of a foster home in Arizona in
her pocket, Pérez, then 18, left Cuba in
February 2000 -- seven months before the Sydney
Olympics.
When the foster home closed, Pérez moved
in with Cruz Olivarria, a social worker who had
begun looking out for her. She got a job as a
waitress.
'By watching cartoons I learned a little bit
of English, like 'Hi, good morning, how are you,
thank you,' '' she said. "[Cartoons] are
very clear with the words they speak. So I kept
on repeating even if I didn't understand what
they were talking about.''
What they didn't teach her was directions, which
proved fortuitous.
After work one day, she boarded a bus headed
in the wrong direction, then fell asleep. At the
end of the route the driver, Guillermo Díaz,
stuck up a conversation that quickly led to sports.
She told him of her exploits in Cuba, and Díaz,
a runner, promptly took her to Pima Community
College to meet coach John Radspinner, who found
her a place in the classroom and on the track
team.
That season she jumped 45 feet 11 ½ inches
and won the national JUCO title. A year later
she jumped a wind-aided 46-10 ¾ to rank
second in the nation and make the world championship
team.
She has won the U.S. outdoor title the past two
years, but her biggest prize hangs on a wall at
home: Her associate's degree from Pima. And in
the fall she'll start classes at the University
of Arizona.
But there's one dream still unfulfilled.
''My goal has always been to carry a U.S. flag
after winning a gold medal. Either in the Pan
Ams or the Olympics,'' she said.
"I don't have anything against the Cuban
people. It just hurt very bad that they -- how
can I say this without being too rude? -- wanted
to stop me from doing what I really wanted to
do.
"We were talking about my dreams you know?
And it really hurt.''
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