If it were not for the shady interests behind the project - a combination of politicking and celebrity chasing - the call in Miami for the first "anti-communist concert," next month, would not deserve a single line. The organizers’ convocation was so pathetic and ridiculous that not even Senator Joseph McCarthy, the 20th century’s champion of anti-communism and witch-hunting, could have imagined anything of the kind.
To sing in support of a supposed "resistance" opposing the Cuban Revolution and to state that this is a growing movement qualifies as typical fake news, destined to attract the unwary or satisfy the demands of a small circle surviving in South Florida for more than half a century, with the encouragement and consent of one political sector in the United States.
The evidence is clear. The mayor of Miami, Francis Suarez, gladly offered a venue to an organization which calls itself the Cuban Democratic Directorate (DDC), which will charge concert-goers spending the evening at James L. Knight Center no less than $54, funds which the group will use to cover operating expenses, support the Directorate and finance an apparatus called Justice Cuba, with some undefined legal purpose.
Suarez, the head of the DDC, Orlando Gutiérrez and the directors of Justice Cuba have agreed on what seems to be an obviously fraudulent scheme to fill their coffers and, at the same time, promote the idea that Cuban society is in a critical, terminal state and justify the intensification of measures adopted by the current U.S. administration to make daily life harder for those of us who live on the island.
Gutiérrez has long been associated with terrorism against Cuba. Three years ago he attempted to encourage sabotage of public transportation and disruption of institutional order. Sowing social chaos on the island has always been one of his key objectives – despite his lack of success. Last year he openly called for a boycott of the constitutional referendum. In view of the repeated failures of his anti-Cuban efforts - for which he continues to receive a paycheck - he decided to try internationalizing his work and was received by Jair Bolsonaro, shortly before he assumed the presidency of Brazil and put an end to the positive relations shared by the South American country and Cuba.
In October of 2019, Gutiérrez staged a nervous breakdown to denounce the King of Spain’s visit to Havana.
Behind Justicia Cuba is Mexican lawyer Rene Bolio, a close ally of Luis Almagro at the Organization of American States. He has become an expert in seeking funds under the pretext of hiring colleagues to help him file international complaints against Cuban figures. Between meetings of Byzantine duration, drafting of voluminous briefs and useless lobbying, the money they receive and collect has been spent. With the concert, they hope to increase their earnings.
No more than 20 artists are committed to the concert, during which not only Cuba will be targeted, but also Nicaragua and Venezuela. The number is not the issue. Few of the participants have respectable artistic careers. Only two or three are known outside of Miami. None of them can claim to have much moral stature.
Here and there, a few have stated that they hope to make history. They will do so, no doubt, since the performance will set records for being out of tune and in disarray.
