Santiago de Cuba: March 6 marked the 65th anniversary of the founding of the Mario Muñoz Third Fronta and the day started with a tribute to the fallen combatants from the Front. The leader of the Cuban Revolution, Army General Raul Castro Ruz,who has just arrived from Venezuela where he attended the tribute to Commander Hugo Chavez Frías, led the ceremony.
At dawn on Monday, the Army General, accompanied by the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, arrived at the mausoleum where the remains of Commander of the Revolution Juan Almeida Bosque, founding leader of this guerrilla front, and of the other members who fell or died after the revolutionary triumph rest with the purpose of paying tribute to a history of more than six decades.
At the top of Loma la Esperanza, where the monument stands, three floral wreaths were placed on behalf of Raul, Diaz-Canel, and the people of Cuba. The flower arrangements were joined by white flowers deposited in the monument by those present.
The ceremony, a brief reverence to the enormous history of a country written by very brave women and men, was also attended by the Commander of the Revolution Guillermo García Frías, founder and second chief of the Third Front; and the members of the Political Bureau, Hero of the Republic of Cuba, Army Corps General Álvaro López Miera, Minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR); and Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla.
The tribute was also attended by Army Corps General Joaquín Quintas Solá, Vice Minister of the FAR, the main authorities of the Party and the Government of the eastern province, as well as relatives of Commander Almeida Bosque.
Then, the political act and military ceremony in salute to the anniversary took place as a culmination of the tribute at the foot of the mountains of the village of Cruce de los Baños. It included a representation of tank and special troops, members of the Youth Labor Army, the National Revolutionary Police, students of military schools of Contramaestre, the Militias of Territorial Troops and the people of the Third Front.
After the National Anthem was performed by the music band of the Eastern Army, three rifle salvoes burst into the mountain range, followed by the solemn silence. The music, composed by Comandante Almeida – who had art running through his veins - also distinguished the commemoration, in a place known to be faithful to the Revolution and to all the glory that has been lived.
Student Natali Naranjo Romero, from the Camilo Cienfuegos basic secondary school, spoke of how inspiring the history of this guerrilla front and the example of its founding leader are. "We are continuity," she said, "we will never forget where we come from, who we are and where we are going."
Reicher Navarro Navarro, a first year cadet of the political-military specialty at the General José Maceo Multidisciplinary Military School, Order Antonio Maceo, called attention to the leading role of young people in every work of the Revolution, because it was young people who built it and it is young people who will continue to carry it forward.
The member of the Central Committee of the Party and of the Council of State, Beatriz Johnson Urrutia, governor of Santiago de Cuba, delivered the keyword of the ceremony, in which she spoke of the trajectory that does not fit in 65 years, of those tremendous moments of the foundation of the Third Front, of the strategic vision of Commander in Chief Fidel Castro, which Almeida materialized, of all the transformations derived from the revolutionary work to put value in the life in the mountains, and of the challenges of the mountains to continue consolidating them.
A tribute to the fallen combatants of the Third Front Mario Muñoz marked the beginning of the commemoration. Photo: Estudios Revolución
On the challenges, specifically, she mentioned the need to offer a medical service of excellence, to perfect the use of land and increase productivity, to promote innovation in industry and to exploit all existing potentialities to respond to a program as sensitive as housing.
"We have the duty and moral commitment to dignify every day the work of the Revolution, together with the ideas of Martí, Maceo, Fidel, Raúl and Díaz-Canel, defending unity and independence, emancipating ourselves by ourselves and with our own efforts," she said.
A special moment was the presentation, from the hands of the General of the Army, of a diploma signed by him to the mausoleum of the Third Front, in recognition of the work done in the preservation of the historical memory of this site that has become a symbol. Yunia Manso Pérez, director of the complex, received the distinction.
Although much remains to be done, the reality of the Santiago de Cuba mountain range confirms, in the words of Juan Almeida Bosque that “the Third Front (...) fulfilled with honor the mission assigned to it by the Commander in Chief, and was one of the pillars of the definitive victory of the Cuban people.” At the same time, as Raúl would say, it also fulfilled the purpose of its founding chief, "with proverbial loyalty, efficiency and spirit of sacrifice."
In addition to these certainties, more than six decades after the founding date, there is another, perhaps even stronger, and that is the unredeemed character of a land that, no matter how difficult times may be, does not and will not surrender.
Translated by ESTI
