Havana, June 20, 2003
Dear President of the Bolivarian
Republic of Venezuela
Hugo Chávez Frías
I have viewed with contempt and
repugnance, the dirty campaign against your noble
proposition to eradicate illiteracy in
Venezuela.
The most employed pretext is the
modest cooperation in this effort on the part of
Cuba, which is being unmercifully attacked and
slandered. Such cooperation is based fundamentally
on details of a technical nature linked to the use
of audiovisual methods in education, whose results
are amazing.
Cuba was the first country in the
hemispheres to eradicate illiteracy. It did so
through the mass mobilization of hundreds of
thousands of students, teachers and other citizens
with a certain education level. It took one year.
The cost in terms of economics and human energy
was high. Although its efficiency was
satisfactory, it cannot compare with what you (the
Venezuelan people) will achieve in just three
months.
It is worthwhile recalling that
Cuba’s literacy campaign was carried out when our
countryside and mountains, where 30% of totally
illiterate citizens lived, were being subjected to
a dirty war unleashed on Cuba from abroad. Bandit
groups killed teachers and literacy workers. In
April of that same year, 1961, Playa Girón was
invaded by a mercenary contingent brought to our
country from Central America, and supported by
U.S. aircraft, ready to intervene.
After repelling that attack, the
first decision taken was not to halt the literacy
campaign.
Despite actions against the
Bolivarian Revolution that the whole world is
aware of, I envy the peace and order that
Venezuela is now enjoying after the events of
April 11, 2002, and the serious and dangerous
attempt to stop the process of change in December
and January, and that will enable it to speedily
promote the fast-track literacy program. Nothing
could be more strategic.
Throughout history, ignorance has
been the inseparable and essential ally of
exploiters and oppressors.
Martí’s phrase; "To be educated is
the only way to be free," is more relevant than
ever in our era, when deception and lies are the
chosen weapons of those who pillage and enslave
the peoples.
Cuba would never have been able to
resist more than 40 years of blockade, aggression
and death threats without education. This
constitutes our invincible weapon. After the
literacy campaign came the follow-up courses,
similar to those that you are proposing.
Today we can proudly affirm that
there is not one single illiterate person in Cuba,
one single child without a school, anybody who
cannot continue schooling up to ninth grade, and
nobody in need of special education unable to
enroll in the pertinent institutions. Perhaps the
most outstanding aspect is that today, university
education is occurring all over the country in 169
municipalities, something that we could not even
dream of when we began to make changes in our
homeland.
How can we speak of freedom and
democracy when millions of people are total or
functional illiterates? What criteria and elements
of judgment can we employ to analyze political
programs and adopt decisions on vital questions
whose essence and content are completely
unknown?
The privileged persons and masters
of the world vehemently wish for masses of
illiterate and semi-illiterate people.
Those affirming that teaching
reading and writing is to Cubanize Venezuelans are
not offending Cuba; on the contrary, they are
honoring it; as is the case with
those who label as indoctrinators
our selfless doctors battling to bring health care
and life to many parts of the world, or our sports
trainers. This is the equivalent of saying that to
save a life or contribute to a young person
obtaining a gold medal for his or her homeland is
to Cubanize the Venezuelan people.
We should thank those stupid people
for such a great honor.
I tell you Hugo, with my hand on my
heart, that Cubans are willing to give their lives
for Venezuela, the Venezuela of Bolívar, Sucre and
Simón Rodríguez.
I especially congratulate you, on a
day like today, for the immense wisdom and courage
to initiate the fight to bring million of men and
women out of the darkness. In 10 or 15 years,
Venezuela can reach what has taken Cuba 44 years
to achieve. Your effort and its results will have
an impact on the hemisphere and the world. Many
other countries will imitate Venezuela’s example.
It will be the best favor that you and Bolívar’s
homeland can do to help the world.
As you like to do, recalling a giant
of our America, I bid you farewell with a ¡Hasta
la Victoria Siempre!
Fidel
Castro
(Granma) June 23, 2003
