Posted on 08/05/2003 1:18:26 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
As his wife was interrogated in her Havana home by State Security agents and Roberto de Miranda spent another day of a 20-year prison sentence in a Cuban jail, the Cuban educator and dissident was praised Tuesday by Cuban Americans 140 miles away as one of the island's leading pro-democracy activists.
De Miranda, 57, was honored in Miami with the Pedro Luis Boitel Award, named for a political prisoner who died in Cuba in 1972. De Miranda is among about 75 dissidents and others who were arrested and jailed in March.
''Mr. de Miranda is a person who has devoted his life to the establishment of free thought in Cuba, who tries to do his best for liberation of thought among young Cubans, and ... to establish a society independent of the government,'' said Philip Dimitrov, former prime minister of Bulgaria, who announced the award Tuesday morning.
''Such people are usually much hated by communist regimes because civil society is one of the greatest menaces to them,'' Dimitrov said.
De Miranda is president of the Association of Independent Teachers, an organization that seeks to separate ideology from the state-run educational system in Cuba and denounce violations against students and professors who do not agree with the political system and government.
The award was created in 2001 by a coalition of Eastern and Central European nongovernmental organizations in conjunction with the Miami-based Cuban Democratic Directorate.
''People who have gotten it have been jailed or are currently in jail, which, under an oppresive and criminal regime, is an honor itself,'' said Dimitrov, a former Bulgarian dissident who became prime minister when the communist regime there fell.
In the United States for a three-month stay at the Woodrow Wilson Institute, Dimitrov came to South Florida to present the award. Lucrecia Rodriguez, a friend and collaborator of de Miranda's, accepted it on the jailed teacher's behalf.
The mathematics teacher was fired from his post in the 1980s after he refused to participate in public political acts and to pass students who did not have adequate grades despite pressure from school administrators, according to Marilu del Toro, spokeswoman for the Directorate.
In 1992, he founded the association, hundreds of independent teachers who give lessons in their homes.
''They teach in their living rooms, without resources, and are preparing the youth of Cuba for a democratic future,'' said Rodriguez, who left Cuba in 1960.
However, Mr. Castro is no match for Father Time. And, at almost 77, it is getting harder for him to hide his waning vigor, evidenced by his recent public fainting spell. He has named Raul Castro, his brother and commander of the armed forces, as his official successor, but Raul is only four years younger and has his own share of health problems. In any case, this Cuban regime has always been a personality cult centered on Fidel Castro and cannot survive unaffected without him.***
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