{"id":231799,"date":"2020-12-17T13:44:29","date_gmt":"2020-12-17T18:44:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/?p=231799"},"modified":"2020-12-17T13:44:29","modified_gmt":"2020-12-17T18:44:29","slug":"human-rights-guide-for-dialogue-in-cuba-i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/opinion\/columns\/vox-populi\/human-rights-guide-for-dialogue-in-cuba-i\/","title":{"rendered":"Human rights: guide for dialogue in Cuba (I)"},"content":{"rendered":"

The second Whereas of the Preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights announces \u201c\u2026the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief.\u201d<\/span>1<\/b><\/p>\n

Since the Declaration was proclaimed in 1948 to 2020, the wounds of inequality among human beings, poverty, hunger, privation of millions of people, social and political rights, have only gotten worse.<\/span><\/p>\n

One of the objectives of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was that they be protected in a regimen of Law, so that human beings would not have as their only recourse the rebellion against tyranny and oppression.<\/span><\/p>\n

Therefore, human rights are not only a catalog of ethical statements that should serve as a social and political reference for states and citizens of the world, but are also a guarantee of the existence of a legal basis that should form a protection regimen for individuals and groups, from the local to the regional to the universal.<\/span><\/p>\n

The legal regimen that the Declaration speaks of is already made up of innumerable international human rights instruments, practices, institutions, procedures, principles, interpretations, jurisprudence, constitutions and national laws.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is very interesting that Article 1 of the Declaration enshrines the duty of human beings to behave fraternally with one another. Fraternity, the lesser known and used emblem of those that made up the motto of the French Revolution, is the starting point of this 1948 document, based on the recognition of the intrinsic dignity of human beings.<\/span><\/p>\n

I also believe that fraternity should be the principle, together with the reason inherent to humanity and equality, by which we must guide ourselves in our current desire to nurture a productive dialogue between groups, people, movements, associations, unions, entrepreneurs, with the State and the government, in a climate of respect for the legal institutions of the country, a useful and essential dialogue for the health of the republic in Cuba.<\/span><\/p>\n

Article 2 of the aforementioned document declares that all people have all the rights without distinction of the political opinion that each one has, which puts us face to face with a basic principle of participation: no one can be excluded from the dialogue for having and expressing political opinions different from a state, party or power apparatus in general, because there exists the right not to be politically discriminated against and because the first meaning of dialogue is to resolve controversies, differences, different points of view, opposing analyzes, different theses on the same problem, alternative proposals on a common dilemma.<\/span><\/p>\n

Article 5 of the Universal Declaration establishes that no one shall be subjected to inhuman or degrading treatment. At a political moment in which dialogue is presented as a petition, when in reality it is a right of every citizen in Cuba, it is necessary for the State to preserve, through the prudence of its officials, a discourse of understanding of the differences and the diversity of Cuban society, typical of the magnanimity of an organized, sovereign, independent political power, legitimized by a recently released Constitution.<\/span><\/p>\n

Individuals can ask for the unusual, groups aspire to radical changes, young generations can suffer from participation anxiety, for the more mature population it is logical that they feel the passage of their last political train, but what does not make sense is that the State responds to all these possibilities with a discourse of criminalization of protest, resistance, dissent and criticism.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is well known that the channels of dialogue that have been institutionalized in Cuba, since 1976, go through a local People\u2019s Power imprisoned in its lack of autonomy, and its rendering of accounts turned, on many occasions, into a ritual of participation more formal than effective.<\/span><\/p>\n

The 1992 Constitutional Reform tried to resolve the gaps of lack of credibility, leadership and power that existed in People\u2019s Power, there where the State seemed most democratic, in the municipalities.<\/span><\/p>\n

To improve this situation of disconnection, which at the time was plastically called the search for the missing link in People\u2019s Power, the People\u2019s Councils were created, which still exist. The constitutional regulation did not hesitate to call them the entity with the most power in the local space, but political practice drowned them in tasks proper of the emergency of the Special Period.<\/span><\/p>\n

Until today the assembly dialogue in Cuba is minimal. You do not see dialogue in the National Assembly, you do not see dialogue in television programs dedicated to political issues, rather presentations of papers, linear speeches are observed, almost never questioned, criticized, or at least dialogued, analyzed, compared.<\/span><\/p>\n

The new Constitution of the Republic takes a step in favor of healthy, comprehensive, respectful, tolerant and democratic dialogue, by recognizing human rights and dignity as the supreme value that sustains them, this in Art. 40 of the great text, and In the next article it establishes that human rights are universal and interdependent, or what is the same, all rights depend on each other and all human beings are considered in the regulation.<\/span><\/p>\n

The bible of a people\u2019s freedom<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n