The eight medical students unjustly murdered November 27, 1871, by supporters of the Spanish colonial power, are neither dead nor forgotten, despite the 150 years that have transpired since the horrendous crime
They were revered by José Martí, Julio Antonio Mella, José Antonio Echeverría and hundreds of other Cuban patriots, when they were fighting to free the nation, and today they are immortalized by students and the entire people, now sovereign and independent still defending the cause for which the innocent students gave their lives.
This Saturday, the 150th anniversary of the injustice, thousands of students from universities across the country, high schools, the Revolutionary Armed Forces, the Ministry of the Interior, and the people marched and held commemorations honoring the eight Cubans murdered by Spanish despots.
The Havana march was led by Party First Secretary and President of the Republic Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, along with Roberto Morales Ojeda, Party Political Bureau member and Secretary of Organization and Cadres Policy, and leader of the Party, the government and youth organizations, led by Aylín Álvarez García, First Secretary of the Young Communists Leagues National Committee.
They marched from the University’s Grand Stairway to the monument built in honor of the eight students in La Punta Park, in Old Havana .
Floral wreaths were placed alongside the monument in honor of the innocent patriots, in the names of Army General Raul Castro Ruz, the President and the country's youth, by future doctors who will fulfill the dreams of Alonso Alvarez de la Campa Gamba, Anacleto Bermudez Gonzalez de Piñera, Jose de Marcos Medina, Angel Laborde Perera, Juan Pascual Rodriguez Perez, Carlos Augusto de la Torre Madrigal, Eladio Gonzalez Toledo and Carlos Verdugo Martinez.
"They were students, they were good young people, they were innocent Cubans, but no argument mattered before the blind thirst for blood that marked the history of Cuba forever," said Mauren Milagros Valdés Pérez, a leader of the University Student Federation, adding that the executioners never imagined that with those shots they would eternalize the young men as symbols for an entire people.
One hundred and fifty years after the crime, committed in a failed attempt to quell the revolutionary effervescence of the Ten Years' War, Cuba honors the murdered students and all those who perished in the struggle for our sovereignty, that triumphed in 1959 and we defend today, against all odds, she continued.
"This is why the streets are filled with Cubans today, they are filled with the heroism that we must defend, loyal to all those who, 150 years ago, suffered the consequences of living in a country without independence... Let us march, let us fight to defend the honor of those who are neither forgotten nor dead," Valdés concluded.
