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The majority of the Cuban people awoke this past November 26 to face a tremendous blow, the country’s heart and soul was in mourning. Fidel had gone the night before, quietly in the late hours, to avoid causing us more pain.
It has been a month now since his death, yet no one feels that Fidel is absent, as the verses of Antonio Machado say, he continues clearing the path as he goes. The chants and affirmations of «I am Fidel» do not let him die, everyone feels he is at their side, continuing the work to which he gave his all: continuing the Revolution, the only way to keep him alive.
What can we do on another 26th to recall him? Go to his legacy. Here we find his ideas on such things. If we are Fidel, let us speak and act like him.
On July 30, 1959, just months after the triumph of the Revolution, Fidel recalled Frank País, on the second anniversary of the young leader’s death at the hands of the Batista dictatorship, «… this is a day of meditation; we need to come here every year to remember those who died in the Revolution. But it must be something like a test of our consciences; it must be a revisiting of what has been done, because the moral torch, the flame of purity our Revolution ignited must be kept alive; it must be kept pristine, must be kept alit, because we can never again allow the flame of our people’s moral virtue to be extinguished.»
He was speaking in the heroic city of Santiago de Cuba, and gave us more insight into his conception of Revolution.
«We must come here every year to revive and strengthen this moral flame. We must come here every year to speak clearly. We must come here every year to denounce any deviation from the Revolution. We must come here every year to denounce any slackening of the revolutionary spirit, not only among the people but among all those leading the Revolution. Because, if there is something we don’t want – and it’s a good idea to say it here, on the anniversary of the deaths of Frank País and Daniel, symbols of an entire generation who made the ultimate sacrifice – well, it’s good to say here that we don’t want anyone to ever say our people have forgotten their dead.» (Taken from en.granma.cu)
