Miami's 3 Cuban-American Congressmen
Posted on 03/29/2003 10:28:56 PM PST by mgist
Posted on Sun, Mar. 30, 2003
Thousands rally on Calle Ocho Continuing call to change Cuba's regime nsanmartin@herald.com
'LONG LIVE A FREE CUBA!' Cuban Americans surge down Southwest Eighth Street on Saturday to support the fight against terrorism and to renew support for democratic reform on the island. A group of (moderate) exiles plans to visit Havana next month. DAVID ADAME/AP
A 12-block-long surge of demonstrators, most of them Cuban Americans, flowed across the heart of Little Havana on Saturday to pump up support for a litany of struggles that stretched from the future of Cuba to the war in Iraq.
With chants of ''Long Live America!'' and ''Long Live A Free Cuba!'' they applauded the Bush administration's tough stance against terrorism and likened Cuba's Fidel Castro to Iraq's Saddam Hussein.
But the sea of red, white and blue flags along Southwest Eighth Street, known more commonly as Calle Ocho, also conveyed one distinct message: that the exile community in Miami has not shifted to a more moderate position in bringing about democratic reform in Cuba, despite recent polls indicating that today's exiles favor a more pragmatic approach.
''All those people going around with their little surveys should take a look at Calle Ocho,'' an animated U.S. Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart, R-Miami, said to resounding applause. ``The exile community does not get confused. It does not make mistakes. The ones who are mistaken are those who are trying to discourage us.''
Carlos Saladrigas, chairman of a prominent Cuban-American organization that has commissioned several polls on the exile community, said the rally did not contradict the results of surveys by his group and The Herald.
''To pretend that a march or a demonstration is an indicator of the will of the majority is inaccurate and even demagogy,'' said Saladrigas, chairman of the Cuba Study Group. ``Polls are a statistical analysis with a high degree of accuracy. The polls indicate an overwhelming rejection of Fidel Castro and his regime and an overwhelming support of dissidents on the island. The more subtle change in Cuban Miami reflects different tactics for achieving democratic reform in Cuba.''
Some analysts said the show of support on Calle Ocho also was a display of political power.
''What we're reminded is that what matters in politics is the voters, and these are the voters,'' said Dario Moreno, a political science professor and director of Metropolitan Center, a Florida International University institute that studies the politics, demographics and the economy of South Florida.
Miami police estimated the crowd at 40,000, with marchers lined along Southwest Eighth Street between Fourth and 16th avenues. Organizers were tallying their own crowd estimate Sunday evening but said they believed the figure to be considerably higher.
Díaz-Balart was joined at the demonstration by his brother U.S. Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart, R-Miami, a freshman in Congress, and U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Miami. 40,000Saturday's gathering comes as more than 600 exiles prepare to travel to Havana next month to meet with Cuban officials at the ''Nation and Emigration'' conference scheduled to take place April 11-13.
Also fueling the debate is the arrest of nearly 80 dissidents on the island. ''This rally is a political game,'' said Max Lesnik, a longtime activist who plans to attend the Havana conference. Rally organizers ``are trying to put the brakes on the moderate voices.''
''If this turns into the symbolic voice of Miami, Miami loses,'' Lesnik said. ``It will depict the community, once again, as sectarian, intransigent and out of sync with changing times.''
Said Moreno of FIU: ``This rally shows, first of all, how difficult it is for some of the people who had sponsored the surveys to reflect change in the community, because a survey is sort of the first step in any political campaign. The question is, how do you use the information?
''On big-ticket items, such as the embargo, the three Congress members are right: The exile community hasn't changed,'' Moreno said. ``On issues from travel to humanitarian aid, food sales and support for dissidents, there is a much more varied position than what was reflected at the rally.
''Those who want to change policy, who want to see the community change, have to transfer the opinion polls to the campaign themselves,'' he said. ``The three Congress members who were present at the rally are able to prove their power in the voting booth.''
As Lincoln Díaz-Balart spoke on a stage set up at Southwest Fourth Avenue, a small plane flew overhead with an advertisement banner calling for the freedom of five Cubans convicted by a Miami jury of trying to infiltrate U.S. military bases and Cuban exile groups in South Florida.
The banner also stated in Spanish: ``The terrorists are on Calle 8 today.''
Longtime activist Ninoska Pérez Castellón, one of the rally organizers, used the opportunity to take a jab at the Cuban government and illustrate what she called the essence of democracy.
''That plane is paid for by the Cuban government,'' Pérez said as the crowd looked up. ``They are asking for the liberty of five assassins. See, that's the definition of a true democracy. Here, a plane can fly overhead without being shot down.''
One of the five was convicted of murder conspiracy charges in a Cuban MiG attack that killed four Miami pilots in international airspace between Florida and Cuba in 1996.
Even as exiles at the rally maintained that the community remains unchanged in its views, Pérez's prominence on a stage shared by South Florida's three Cuban-American lawmakers was indicative of a transformation in the exile leadership.
Pérez is among those who lead a splinter group known as the Cuban Liberty Council, comprising mostly former board members of the Cuban American National Foundation.
Joe Garcia, executive director of CANF, said there was no disagreement among exiles about maintaining current U.S. policy; the dispute centers on whether democratic reform should be fostered from within the island or from Miami.
Miami's 3 Cuban-American Congressmen
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