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| Commandante Fidel Castro, leader of the Cuban revolution |
By
Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey
Fidel
Castro Ruz, leader of the Cuban Revolution, former President of Cuba for nearly
five decades, formerly third-longest standing Head of State, passed away last
Friday night but remains as a colossal monument to human endeavor and
social achievement, a tremendous history is the story book of humankind.
Having
survived countless assassination attempts by the CIA, having stood up to
decades of an inhuman and inhumane blockade, having seen his economic and
social model survive and having built a valid example of an alternative
socio-economic model for the future, while providing substantial humanitarian
aid programmes abroad, Fidel has left humankind sadder but enriched.
Fidel
Castro Ruz will enter the annals of history as a Hero of Humanity. He entered
Havana triumphantly in January 1959, after a two-year guerrilla campaign
against the unconstitutional government of the dictator Fulgencio Batista.
A
monument to human social development
He
inherited a poor, backward country with a largely illiterate population,
the backyard of the USA whose high and mighty used Havana as a private whore
house and the island as a playground. He closed the casinos, he cleaned up
Havana, he organized the island and started to implement a progressive
socialist government which began to provide high quality public services and to
open opportunities to all.
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| Fidel Castro meets Ghana's Kwame Nkrumah at Accra |
Resisting the United States' murder attempts
As Fidel Castro resisted and survived numerous acts of attempted
murder (over six hundred) by the CIA, Cuba and Cuban society resisted and
survived, despite every attempt to sabotage the model. Cuba was given back to
the Cubans. Excellent education and healthcare systems were installed,
accommodation, work, leisure time activities, transportation, energy and
pensions were all provided as a birthright.
In 1963, Fidel Castro launched the internationalization of the
Cuban model, exporting cooperation programmes in the areas of education,
healthcare and development without any interest in economic returns.
Today, Cuba supports
nearly thirty thousand healthcare workers in hundreds of programmes in nearly
70 countries, while a medical training programme involving 19 faculties of
medicine in African and the Escuela Latino Americana de Medicina, in Cuba, attended by 9.000 students from
around the world, trains the doctors and nurses of tomorrow. All of these schemes
are supported financially by Cuba. None of these schemes are reported in the
biased western media.
Fidel Castro left
us, knowing that his Revolution and successful implementation of a viable model
will survive him, knowing that he has provided Humanity with a shining example
of what can be done to help millions of people by providing public services and
not by being obsessed with making profits.
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| Fidel loved children too |
A shining model
In a world in which monetarist capitalism is more and more
squeezing Humankind to a pulp, where giant corporations are steadily making
inroads to monopolize wealth and the means of production, Cuba stands out like
an oasis, showing that there is another way, proving that it is possible, with
few resources, to construct a socially progresive model and demonstrating how
contagious the vision and willpower of a single man can be, in providing
gratuitous development programmes which have helped the lives of millions of
people over the years. Despite the United States' blockade and how fitting that
the most shining example of debauchery, depravity and despotism is the US
torture and concentration at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Finally Fidel Castro spent his last years writing columns which
showed a tremendous insight into complex geopolitical issues, teaching analysts
and journalists how to read events as they unfolded, something which I learned
with him and for which I will be eternally grateful. I consider Fidel as my
mentor.
None of this will ever be forgotten. And for this, Comrade Fidel,
thank you!
Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey
