Explosion of Lilies (Chronicle for March 8th) | Directorio Democrático Cubano

Press Releases

From Cuba

Articles

Human Rights

Media Coverage

» Articles

Explosion of Lilies (Chronicle for March 8th)
By Manuel Vázquez Portal

Havana, March 2005 (www.cubanet.org)

And then they gathered. Not to cry. Not to lament. Not to beg for clemency. It was to cry out for justice that they came together.

They were seen arriving at church: one, two, many. At the end of mass, when God had calmed their troubled hearts, they paraded down the avenue. They marched in silence, dressed in white.

It was Havana. Sunday. April 2003. It was spring, blackened by the cruel hand of the government, sprouting in the germinated steps of women who had recently joined in the battle.

They would later be known as the Ladies in White. But in the beginning, the residents of the elegant neighborhood, the passers-by of the flowered boulevard, the motorists in air-conditioned cars, tired by so many demonstrations organized by the government, did not even give them a quick look.

They persevered, already under the intimidating watch of the Cuban state police.

Who were these ladies dressed in white, many with their small children at hand, who went each Sunday to the church of Santa Rita on Fifth Avenue in Miramar? The residents of the elegant neighborhood, the passers-by of the flowered boulevard, the motorists in air-conditioned cars began to ask themselves.

“We are the wives, the mothers, the sisters of 75 honest, respectable, brave beings, who the Cuban government has incarcerated for the sole crime of loving freedom.”

“They are crazy”, people said: such is the fear planted in the minds of the people for almost half a century.

“They are going to make them disappear”, people feared: such is the evidence of terror and brutality that the people have witnessed for almost half a century.

“What courage!” they finally admired.

And the admiration increased. And the respect increased. And the solidarity increased.

The residents of the elegant neighborhood appeared on their balconies to observe them. The passers-by of the flowered boulevard stopped to look. The motorists in air-conditioned cars reduced their speed. And they greeted them. And they flattered them with words of praise. And they encouraged them.

They were Yolanda, Bertha, Laura, Bárbara, Caridad, Margarita. They were Loida, Osleivis, Yamilé, Magaly, Elsa, Dolia. They were women. They were the people. They had reclaimed the street from the repression of the Cuban government. This had never been done before. They were the embryo of what would one day occur in mass quantities. Demanding freedom for their husbands, their sons, and their brothers who were savagely and arbitrarily incarcerated by Fidel Castro’s regime.

They were not madwomen. They were Laura, teacher; Loida, economist; Elsa, nurse. They were not nobodies. They were Yolanda, philologist; Oleivis, doctor; Yamilé, lawyer. They were not adventurous. They were Bertha, microbiologist; Magaly, veterinarian; Caridad, worker. Today, almost all of them are unable to practice their professions. They are the lepers. They are the excrement of society. They are the wives of the 75.

Their pleas, their walks –which were rarely even rumored at first- turned into gossip, noise, news. And so came journalists from the four corners of the world. And it was known in London, in Paris, in New York and Brussels, in Rome and in Toronto, that a group of women, defying the repression by Castro and of Castro, paraded each Sunday, dressed in white, on the same route used by Castro in his trips from his mansion to his offices.

But most of all, it was known in Havana, in Mantua and Sibancú, in Ranchuelo and Morón. The people began by commenting about it, then praising it, later supporting them, although it was only through their affection.

The repressive forces were feather-brained. They did not know how to react to such purity. Urgent memorandums were exchanged. Emergency orders were given. And it is rumored that one day, Fidel Castro himself, strongly escorted- as usual- went out to witness this explosion of lilies.

A counteroffensive was organized by the government.

On the church corner, they placed a vast police operative, without any disguises, with the malicious intention to intimidate. The state police visited and threatened the women. They interfered in telephone calls between the prisoners and their families. They tried to bribe them with false promises of improvements for their incarcerated loved ones. They plotted with some and with others to divide them. They gave them alms of extra visits and birthday gifts. They spread all sorts of injurious defamations against the most outstanding ones. They tried to intimidate the pastor of the church.

They achieved nothing.

The Ladies in White, proud, worthy, loving, kept marching each Sunday. They didn’t have leaders or political purposes. They defended only the right of their families to remain united, without their men being cut-off from their families by unjust imprisonment.

It has been two years since they were first seen.

Yolanda, Bertha, Laura, Bárbara, Caridad, Margarita, Loisa, Elsa, Osleivi, Yamilé, Dolia, and Marcela have languished in body, but strengthened in soul. An aura of legend inhabits them. They go surrounded by Manana’s halo, firm support of general Máximo Gomez; by the light of María Cabrales, faithful spouse of the Mulatto Titan; by the romantic sweetness of Amalia Simoni, eternal love of the eternal gentleman Ignacio Agramonte. They have relived the lineage of Martí. They are light and hope.

Their brightness is due to their perseverance. Theirs is the merit. They have been the protagonists of tributes and protests by their prisoners. The 19^th of March 2004- the one year anniversary of the imprisonment of the 75- they marched until they reached 15^th and K street, in Vedado, their they cried out “Freedom! Freedom!”, in front of the national leaders of jails and prisons. Later, without losing heart, with their feet tired and almost having to carry their children, they arrived at the distant town of Playa where they delivered a request for a general amnesty which they had signed to the authorities of the National Assembly of Popular Power- the Cuban Parliament.

On Father’s Day, they took 75 gladiolus flowers to the church gardens that await them each Sunday.

They gather each month in a Literary Tea and read letters that arrive from the prisons, and poems dedicated to them and written by them. They exchange books that they later transfer to the squalid cells where their imprisoned loved ones suffer.

They have sent letters to national officials, to prominent artists and authors around the world, to officials from international organizations and foreign governments.

In order to obtain medical attention for their imprisoned loved ones, they have had to resort to organizing a sit-in in areas of the Civic Plaza -known as the “plaza of the revolution”-, remaining overnight until they were forcefully removed by state police forces.

They have carried, with modesty and serenity, pinned to their blouses, seals with photos of their imprisoned family members, and when someone- on the suffocating bus packed with people; on the long, anguish filled line at the market, in the dusty streets filled with potholes- asks, they respond proudly:

- I am the wife of Hector Maseda, engineer, mason, independent journalist, president of the illegal Liberal Party…

- I am the wife of Angel Moya, black, poor, defender of human rights…

- I am the wife of Alfredo Felipe Fuentes, economist, member of the National Council of the Varela Project.

- I am the wife of Adolfo Fernández Saíz, translator of English-Spanish simultaneously, independent journalist…

They respond, explain, break the silence that the propagandist machinery and the repressive Cuban forces want to dump on the crime that they committed by incarcerating 75 political dissidents and independent journalists.

They have gathered signatures from citizens, with the total number of signatures reaching 1,043, which they delivered, escorted by a legion of foreign journalists, to the Council of State on the 18^th of February 2005. They have received the backing of the 25, 000 signatures of the Varela Project, as its’ Section 2-A calls for amnesty for all prisoners of conscience.

They are the Ladies in White. They don’t appear on Cuban television. Cuban newspapers don’t speak about them. They are not heard of on Cuban radio. Nevertheless, their presence cannot be concealed in the city. They are amongst us. In church. In line at the market. In the blackouts. Under the rain without umbrellas. In the midday sun. This is why they have become close, known, familiar. The people say: There go the Ladies in White.

They have turned into unquestionable truth the words Jose Martí would write, from his immortality. Perhaps Martí was prophesizing about the Ladies in White when he expressed: “The campaigns of the people are only weak when the heart of woman is not recruited; but when women help, when the timid and quiet woman, cheers and applauds, when the learned and virtuous woman anoints the work with the honey of her affection, the work is invincible.”

Invincible are the Ladies in White. Castro knows it.

Send by E-mail | Printable Version