Cuban students seek Fidel's ouster

Cuban voices echoed off the blackboards in Frist 304 Wednesday night, expressing a collective hope that Fidel Castro's repressive regime will soon end.

In a conference call with students from the University's chapter of the Cuban-American Undergraduate Student Association (CAUSA), members of the Cuban Youth for Democracy Movement (CYDM) discussed the persecution and economic hardship that Cuban university students face.

"They have waited all their lives to speak up and express themselves," CAUSA member Ken Sinkovitz '07 explained. "This is their dream."

CAUSA — Spanish for "cause" — is dedicated to raising awareness throughout the Princeton community and beyond about Cuban oppression, marginalization and poverty. Through conference calls and other parts of the CYDM's "Universities without Borders" program, students can receive Cuba "uncensored," Sinkovitz said.

The students' dreams are countered by harsh realities. Many of the movement's members, including its president, are currently imprisoned for dissenting political activities. Economic, political and educational repression dogs those who persist in activities deemed anticommunist or anti-Castro.

"If a young person doesn't work or study, he is incarcerated," a Cuban dissident explained through a student translator. "And since young people [in the dissident movement] are often thrown out of school and are not allowed to work, they can easily be arrested." He called this law "an attempt to silence the voices of those of us who have dissenting opinions."

Merely associating with dissidents can lead to problems. A 21-year-old art teacher was jailed and abandoned by her family when she refused to break off her friendship with a known dissident.

"It's been very hard, everything I've gone through," the woman said, "but I will go on ... My friends and family will understand soon enough that they too have been victims of repression."

This repression, one man said, also extends to the workplace. With salaries of $4 per month, Cuban youths are kept in economic "slavery," he said.

The Cubans also cited lack of medical care as a persistent problem. Doctors and medicines "are being exported [into Cuba] as part of a campaign by the government," one man said. However, he added that only the wealthy can obtain the drugs.

Despite their troubles many in the country remain hopeful. Since Fidel Castro ceded power to his brother Raul, many students see evidence to hope that things will soon change.

"We can already perceive on the horizon a clear light, the light of change and freedom," one imprisoned dissident said.

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CAUSA co-president Christine Edmiston '09 sees such dialogue as "mutually inspiring."

"Each time after hearing [Cuban representatives], I have to think how fortunate I am." Yet, she says, Cuban dissidents are also inspired by the interest and concern of people outside their own island.

Students at CAUSA are seeing growth within the United States. In April 2006, the group sponsored one of the largest gatherings of Cubans in the country. The conference, which was held at the University and cosponsored by Harvard, was attended by more than 150 delegates from CAUSA chapters across the United States and South America.