http://themilitant.com/2016/8021/802155.html
The Militant (logo)
Vol. 80/No. 21 May 30, 2016
Cuban farmers: US gov’t aims to break our unity
As part of the reestablishment of diplomatic relations between the
U.S. and Cuban governments, U.S. President Barack Obama has stated that
the economic embargo of Cuba should end. Nonetheless, the embargo —
imposed more than 55 years ago in a failed attempt to bring the Cuban
people to their knees — remains in place. While its tactics are
changing, U.S. imperialism’s goal remains the same: the overturning of
the 1959 revolution that removed a U.S.-backed dictatorship and brought
working people to power.
Among the shifts Washington is implementing is trying to use U.S.
policy, money and other enticements to increase the size and weight of
privately owned businesses on the island. The U.S. government aims to
increase pressure from below to expand the influence of the capitalist
market there; undermine social solidarity and foster a dog-eat-dog
mentality; and weaken workers’ control of conditions on the job as well
as economic planning that promotes decisions based on the needs of
working people, not on the profit motive.
Reprinted below is a statement by the National Bureau of the National
Association of Small Farmers of Cuba printed May 5 in Granma, the daily
paper of the Communist Party of Cuba, answering Washington’s latest
moves in that direction. Translation is by the Militant.
❖
On April 22, the State Department announced the decision to include
coffee on the list of Cuban products produced by the non-state sector
that may be imported into the United States. This is a continuation of a
measure adopted by the U.S. government in February 2015 — authorizing
very limited exports from Cuba — which excluded all goods and services
produced by state enterprises.
It is striking that in announcing the decision, the State Department
clarifies that to qualify, Cuban entrepreneurs have to prove that their
business “is not owned or controlled” by the Cuban government and noted
that this is another measure whose purpose is to “support the ability of
the Cuban people to gain greater control over their own lives and
determine their country’s future.”
What the State Department didn’t mention is the fact that Cuba was
unilaterally stripped of its most-favored nation status after the
blockade was decreed — a status that was our right as a founding member
state [in 1948] of the International Trade Organization — and that in
order to export any Cuban product to the United States, the highest
customs duties had to be paid, making exports to the United States
virtually impossible.
The State Department also ignores the fact that the Agrarian Reform Law,
enacted after the triumph of the Revolution in 1959, made more than
200,000 peasant families owners of the land, and that since then the
Cuban state has implemented a program for the social, economic and
productive development of the peasantry of our country and has
guaranteed production assistance, access to credit, a secure market for
their produce and other social benefits.
No one should think that a Cuban small farm producer can export directly
to the United States. For this to be possible, Cuban foreign trade
enterprises must participate and financial transactions need to be in
U.S. dollars, issues that so far have not been settled.
We are conscious that the objective of these measures is to influence
Cuban farmers and separate them from our state.
Cuban small farmers do not fear changes, provided they are of our own
making. This is the powerful reason why the permanent aim of the
government of the United States to shatter the unity of the people of
Cuba can not be permitted as this would destroy a revolutionary process
that has provided us with a participatory democracy, freedom,
sovereignty and independence.
Cuban peasants are members of socialist civil society and we are part of
the state, which represents the power of the people, and not in
opposition to it. Together with the workers and all our people, we face
the imperialist policy of promoting the division and disintegration of
Cuban society, which is what is intended with a measure such as the
recently announced one.
If the government of the United States really wants to contribute to the
welfare of Cubans, what it must do is definitively lift the economic,
commercial and financial blockade imposed for more than 50 years, which
is the main obstacle to the development of Cuba.
Cuban peasants reaffirm our loyalty to our revolutionary state against
all risks and challenges. We will continue to build a prosperous and
sustainable socialism, with all and for the good of all, with the
patriotic commitment to continue producing for the people.
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home