IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 6 ENGLISH | Page 40

they may be presented abroad in an
opportunistic way, at LASA,23 for
example.24 Yet, ever since 1962, José
Felipe Carneado23 decreed that the issue
of race had been deconstructed. There
were many intellectuals and unionists at
that time who were members of black
and mestizo organizations prior to the
Revolution’s triumph. During that year,
there was a TV debate between Juan
René Betancourt25 and Fidel Castro in
which the former called upon the latter
to keep the race issue on the public
agenda. The official response was to
expel him and exile him to Argentina,
etc. There is also the case of Carlos
Moore, a researcher with two doctorates
from the University of Paris VII who is
currently retired in Brazil. His positions
caused him to be subjected to forced
labor at a work camp due to his criticism
of the Cuban government’s official
policies regarding racism.26 He later
requested exile at the Embassy of
Guinea in Cuba. He has been
“demonized” in Cuba on account of his
global activism.”27
As far as
institutional quotas are concerned, for
example, Madrazo Luna affirms that the
few black and mestizo members serve
only cosmetically, as superficial makeup
to cover up deeper problems), in the
parliament’s
demographic
makeup
(quotas have long been defended as a
governmental policy for youth, blacks,
and women). This has gone on while
limited but interesting initiatives are
being discussed, some of which have
been rejected out right by the
officialdom that suggested them. The

Color Cubano initiative, which was
“born in the 1990s, within the UNEAC,
carried out a series of actions so that the
conversation about race could be seen
and heard publicly, and exist on the
public agenda. There were many closeddoor debates, but this institution’s
discussion group was discontinued. They
created the [Aponte] Commission, which
currently keeps the issue much more
under wraps. Various bloggers who
write about the problems of racial
discrimination in Cuba have emerged on
the scene, independently, but they are
not known within the country. Only
those who have Internet access do.”28 A
suggestive synthesis that has been
developed from that position focuses on
the way in which the race problem has
been dealt with historically in Cuba:
“The Colony had no interest in resolving
the problem of blacks; the Republic
acknowledged the problem and allowed
associationism and public debate about
it, but did not create or employ
institutional solutions; the Revolution
took educational and institutional
measures, but dismantled civil society
and its corresponding rights.”29
(In)Conclusive words for a worsening
problem
Given
demands
for
the
acknowledgement and overcoming of
historical silences and exclusions, a State
and party strategy for the problem of
racial discrimination depends on Afrodescendant interests and demands being
subordinated to “national unity” and
putting off an open, nationwide

40