Corruption

Corruption / Rafael Leon Rodriguez

Rafael Leon Rodriguez, Translator: Unstated



In another of the many meetings of recent days, the XI International

Criminal Sciences Meeting 2012, the General Controller of the Republic,

Gladys Bejarano Portela, urged, from ethics and professionalism, the

confrontation of economic crimes and illegalities. Again the obligatory

topic of corruption, focuses the interest of the participants on a legal

event.



The fact is that, during so many years the sweeping of these systemic

phenomena of Cuban socialism were swept under the rug, that now its

effusion covers all spheres of society. Now the General-President had

called attention again, during the last extended Cabinet meeting, ending

September, to work with rigor and discipline in order to eliminate the

disorganization that drives the waste, theft and negligence.



He referred to delinquency in the collections and payments between

enterprises and agencies and the increase in the string of defaults.

The fact is that there is no custom of respecting contracts or budgets

or schedules, because for many years they directed the country by

command, by means of government directives. And those rains brought

this mud.



The Attorney General of the Cuban Republic spoke in the Meeting about

the respectful vocation of the law and the legality of the revolution

during its historical evolution. This contrasts with the aphorism that

the revolution is the source of law because it was the revolutionary

power that upset even the country's judicial symbols.



They appropriated from the designated buildings those which impart

justice, like the building that today is occupied by the State Counsel

and the Central Party Committee: the current Palace of the Revolution.

This building, which they inherited from the past regime, was intended

for the Palace of Justice. The headquarters of the Pines Island

Tribunal in Nueva Gerona, for example, was converted to an ice cream

shop in the second half of the 1960's and so, through all the national

territory, the semiotics of what is legal suffered inherently with

respect to the law.



Enemies of the old law and obedient to the new, they headlined

themselves the powerful debut. But they have been the first violators

of their own laws. A recent example: article 57 of the Constitution of

the Cuban Republic expresses that correspondence is inviolable. It can

only be used, opened and examined in cases previewed by the law.

Matters irrelevant to the purpose of the examination will be kept

secret. The same principle will be observed with respect to cable,

telegraph and telephone communications.



On a television program last month, they made public a telephone

conversation of an opponent who was on hunger strike in her home in the

capital. The arbitrary detention of dissidents; the deportations to

their provinces of all who are where it does not suit the authorities;

the known acts of repudiation against opponents and dissidents,

organized by the same authorities that supposedly should prevent them,

finally, the stigma that we are all guilty before the law, until we

prove otherwise.



Also talked about at the event was the comprehensive analysis of the

country's Criminal Justice System that is being carried out, which will

generate, according to the Attorney General, important modifications to

the Penal code, the Law of Criminal Procedure and other legal norms. By

now, the Lady of Justice, with eyes blindfolded and scales in hand,

gives a suspicious wink to Cubans, observing everything, hiding behind

the dark glasses of totalitarian power.



October 16 2012



http://translatingcuba.com/corruption-rafael-leon-rodriguez/