Walesa on Cuba

Ex-President of Poland, Noble Peace Prize winner and communism-buster Lech Walesa is currently Miami talking to Cuban exile groups and making appearances on TV. He spoke to an audience of 200 yesterday morning regarding Cuba's future, and what to expect after fidel's departure.

Walesa basically echoed what the University of Miami Institute of Cuban Studies concluded from their simulation last week, that Cuba will likely suffer through a violent transition period after fidel.

Here's the Sun-Sentinel's coverage of Walesa's speech, which is superior to that of the Miami Herald's; rather shocking considering the author of the Sentinel piece is none other than Madeline Baro Diaz. Not even Baro could hide the truth behind Walesa's words.

Ex-Polish leader warns U.S. Cubans of possible chaos when Communism ends

By Madeline Baró Diaz
Miami Bureau
Posted February 10 2006

MIAMI · Former Polish President Lech Walesa said Thursday that Cuban-Americans will need to be armed with good ideas for Cuba's future when the island's communist government comes to an end.

"There could be anarchy. All the structures could fall ... anarchy is worse than anything else," he said. "You should be prepared."

Walesa, a Nobel laureate, made the remarks during a breakfast hosted by Miami-Dade College at the Marriott Biscayne Bay hotel in downtown Miami. It was one of the stops on Walesa's latest visit to the United States.

Miami-Dade College President Eduardo Padron presented Walesa with the school's Presidential Medal. Walesa is the second recipient of the honor. The first was Cuban poet and journalist Raul Rivero, a former political prisoner who visited the college last year.

Walesa spent years fighting against the communist system in his native Poland and Eastern Europe as the leader of the Solidarity Labor Movement. In 1983, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and in 1990, after communism ended in Poland, he was elected president.

On Thursday, Walesa continued to rail against communism, blaming repressive communist governments for millions of deaths.

"This is one of the worst systems," he said, speaking through a translator. "All the wars together have not killed so many people as ... communism."

The relevance of his experience to South Florida's Cuban-American community was acknowledged by State Rep. Marco Rubio, R-Miami, who introduced Walesa.

"We are a community of men and women who've lost their youth, their families, their homes, to the same types of oppression that once visited your people," Rubio said. "You are to many of us the single greatest living democratic hero in the world."

Walesa, who participated in a teleconference with dissidents in Cuba last month, said they, too, must prepare to rebuild, from the most basic structural level, to meet the daily needs of Cubans.

But he added that because of the electronic nature of his meeting with dissidents, he knows they were not candid with him.

"They could not discuss many of their concerns because [(f)idel] (c)astro was listening," he said.

Walesa also expressed concern that left-leaning governments in Latin America, such as Brazil, Bolivia and Venezuela were a step back in time.

"Everything I see or observe in Latin America and elsewhere belongs to the old time, to the 20th century," he said.

Madeline Baró Diaz can be reached at mbaro@sun-sentinel.com or 305-810-5007.