CAMAGÜEY.- Oscar López Rivera is not a hero of Vietnam, he is not either an urban guerrilla fighter, as the Wikipedia repeats, he prefers that they call him by what he is truly: a fighter for the independence of Puerto Rico, the only crime that cost him 36 years in prison.
Normally the questions that my companions ask him are how did you resist, what are you going to do now, how much has your life changed since you are free. Nevertheless, he only thinks about the present and the future of his dear island, that's why the prison for this small giant, although left traces on him, it is only the past.
-Very much one speaks about Puerto Rico in these days: do you believe that the current situation in the Island of the Delight could do that the Puerto Ricans win in conscience?
- The situation in Puerto Rico has always been complex, but after Maria it has become tremendously complex, because the agriculture is in zero, and we were already importing 86 % of what was consumed, this explains why the life in the Island is more expensive than in the United States. We have fallen down in the consumerism that the media promotes, for example, I do not understand how it is possible that in a house you can found three or four cars, almost one for member of the family, but the same car of the year you begin paying now and when you finish it is already a scrap.
“This life style became very popular in Puerto Rico. Now, after Maria, and even a little earlier, the poverty undressed, we were never a nation of the First World to have a similar way of life, we are a colony. Today little more than 45 % of the Puerto Ricans, we live in the poverty. We have not planned anything, we have not either thought about the future, something that are going to pay our grandchildren and all the generations that avenge.
“Now with the hurricane we had left a country without communications, without electricity, and today, to days of the phenomenon, only 15 % of the population has the service, the rest is without drinking water, and we are going to be still like that for a long period, because we are indebted, we cannot receive help because the Government of the United States does not allow it, I saw the return of the brigade of Cubans that went to help the Mexicans after the earthquake and I thought that we cannot receive a similar help.
“Puerto Rico has not been prepared for the geographical conditions that it has, we do not have a Civil Defense, we have a National Guard which is not to give service to the people, I have not seen only one military man doing anything to help his people. One goes to San Juan and the hotels are full of military men.
“Trump´s government offered as help 4.9 million dollars in loan, what help is that, especially if he knows that we have a debt for 64 million dollars, it is dirty and criminal because none of us knows where this money went to, now the Trump Administration hired for 300 million dollars a company to recover the electrical service, but we have sufficient potential in engineers to do it, why not to give these millions to the same Puerto Ricans, if we are the only ones that are doing something for raising the country. One´s heart breaks seeing the conditions of the people, how they are living in the poverty and nobody does anything because their goal is to turn us into another State of the Union, but we love our nation and we will look for the way of building a proper country project”.
-You said when you arrived that you felt as at home, to several days of being in Cuba: what has this visit meant for Oscar?
- To be in Cuba is very significant, I come to listen and to learn because we have a country to build and you are a good example, all this is a part of a dream of many years. I hope to be able to return some day.
-One of your dreams was to see Fidel alive; nevertheless, this was not possible...
- Fidel is one of the examples that I have followed in my life, I have tried to be faithful to his belief, for years I was informed about everything of this country and of the world, and what I admire the most of his personality is how he managed to develop the human resource, to the point of being the principal one in the nowadays Cuba.
Finally, Oscar López wanted to send a message to Camagüey’s people: "I want to greet the people of Camagüey, I wished the best to this so significant people in the Cuban revolutionary struggle, I incite you to continue the legacy of the Commander Fidel, and not to stop fighting, I go away, but I have the commitment to return to share with the children of this land”.
- Translated by Linet Acuña Quilez