Yours is the 25th case of 2015

16.01.2015 .
Havana, Cuba

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Yours is the 25th case of 2015

I was finally able to speak with the person who serves as my parole supervisor. She explained that, from this moment, the prosecutor has seven days to bajar la medida, or to bring charges, the technical term for what happens during this phase. She makes it clear as well that I can’t get an attorney until the charges are filed but that the attorney I’ve talked to already (whom they still can’t identify, which prompts them to ask me questions in a variety of ways to see if I’ll spill his name) may go see the file on his own (although he can’t file a response yet and, technically, can’t even begin to work on the case).

I’m surprised by all this because, up to now, she and a specialist from State Security had explained that the prosecutor had ten working days (which ended yesterday) to bring charges and that, once I had my case number, I could contract a lawyer. I’m concerned that the prosecutor is just now receiving my case because every time I was arrested I was told it was the prosecutor who would decide whether I had o stay or could go free.

But what does any of that matter, or if it was true or pure manipulation, when I read the news that some of the prisoners released as part of the negotiations with the United States were physically attacked and some even detained again for wanting to meet (isn’t that what Fidel, Raúl and their friends did when they were released from prison?).

What difference does it make to have my file number when it seems the Cuban government is only interested in negotiating money matters and not human rights, nor in the transparency of the political and economic processes that will define the lives of many Cubans who have not been given the opportunity to be heard, if in fact we’ll continue with a system which merely informs about its decisions and leaves no option of response other than to accept unquestioningly.

What difference does it make that they’ve moved the dates for the decision about my case until after the U.S. government delegation has left, since the only thing that matters about the U.S. are its products and not its history of struggling for civil rights. What does any of this matter when all they want is for us to be consumers and not citizens.

Tania Bruguera

Havana

January 16, 2015