Abuja, January 11, 2024-. The Ambassador of the Republic of Cuba in Nigeria, Miriam Morales Palmero, together with all the staff of the Embassy celebrated, accompanied by representatives of the Nigerian political sphere, members of the diplomatic corps accredited in Abuja, graduate students on the Island, Cuban residents, friends and other guests, the 65th anniversary of the Triumph of the Cuban Revolution.
During the simple but significant act, the Ambassador highlighted several of the achievements of the Cuban Revolution and denounced once again the unjust sanctions that the United States government has imposed on the Island for more than 60 years.
As part of Nigeria's affection and support for the Cuban people, the Minister of Youth and Development, Dr. Jamila Bio Ibrahim, was present; the special envoy of the Minister of Health, Dr. Rukayyat Guni; the Director of Regions of the Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mrs. Janet Olisa; and the Director of the Department of International Relations of the ruling party All Progressives Congress (APC), Mr. Ini Akpan Morgan.
The celebration was also conducive to announcing that next July 1 will be commemorating the 50th Anniversary of Bilateral Relations between Cuba and Nigeria, an epic moment of historic exchange between sister nations.
Below, speech given by Ambassador Miriam Morales Palmero.
CONMEMORATIVE WORDS OF THE AMBASSADOR OF CUBA IN THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA ON THE OCASIÓN OF THE 65 ANNIVERSARY OF THE TRIUMPH OF THE CUBAN REVOLUTION
ABUJA, JANUARY 11, 2024
Distinguished Ambassadors and other representatives from the Diplomatic Corps accredited in Abuja,
Dear Nigerian sisters and brothers,
Dear friends,
Thank you very much for accepting our invitation to celebrate together the Sixty Fifth Anniversary of the Triumph of the Cuban Revolution.
When the Federal Republic of Nigeria declared its independence on October the first 1960, the Cuban Revolution had proclaimed its true independence, some two years before. The fighting had first begun in 1869; later on, against the military intervention of the United States of America, which begun in 1899 turning Cuba into an American neo-colony.
Today we assemble for two very significant commemorations: The birth, on the First of January 1959, of a sovereign and independent Cuba, in which the exaltation to man’s true dignity prevails, as conceived by our National Hero José Martí in the XIX Century, and later turned into reality by Commander in Chief Fidel Castro Ruz, as he, victoriously, entered Havana leading the vanguard of the revolutionary rebel troops.
The other very significant date is the Fiftieth Anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Cuba and the Federal Republic of Nigeria on the first of July 1974, which we all will be celebrating during this year with different activities to honor, as it deserves, the steady development of our bilateral relations in all spheres.
With the same strength represented by the Eagle of gules on the Nigerian coats of arms, its two silver horses as symbol of dignity and its motto “Unity and Faith, Peace and Progress”; we Cubans with the same determination will continue to defend our independence and sovereignty based on the unity of the whole Cuban people, the unbreakable faith on attaining in peace the future of progress and sustainability for which we continue fighting.
We will do it under the same motto of the Cuban combatants of the XIX Century “Long Live Free Cuba”, and the determination marked by Fidel Castro when he exclaimed “Fatherland or Death, We shall overcome”.
It has been Sixty-Five years of covert military aggression, decades of terrorist acts and economic sabotage, maligned by the infamy of a commercial, economic and financial blockade against our country by the government of the United States of America and, furthermore, the nefarious inclusion of Cuba by President Donald Trump´s government, in the list of countries supposedly sponsoring terrorism.
It is an aggressive policy which has yet to be eliminated by the government of Joe Biden; in spite of the fact that the blockade policy against Cuba has been repealed thirty-one times by the international community at large represented at the United Nations with only negligible but shameful exceptions; and the overwhelming consensus that prevails in the United States in favor of a change of policy towards Cuba.
Now, in the cyber era, by means of the most sophisticated technological means, the United States of America launches one propaganda campaign after the other in the hopes of portraying Cuba as a failed state, a futile effort to try and negate the social progress achieved by the revolution.
The United States of America would have you believe that a failed state was able to put an end to its neo-colonial status, eliminated illiteracy, converted education and health care into universal rights of the people, opened the way to the elimination of all kinds of discrimination: Those of gender, skin color, mental or physical disability, sexual preferences; expanded the countries industrialization, established a sovereign and independent foreign policy ready to cooperate with all peace loving countries while walking together with its sisters and brothers of the South.
During the last six decades, that allegedly failed state, has made possible that 600 000 health professionals render their collaboration in 165 countries; and more recently, during the Covid-19 pandemic, 3000 members of the Henry Reeve Medical Contingent were deployed in 30 countries around the world.
It is the same country in which around 27 000 young people from a 100 countries have graduated in the Latin American School of Medical Sciences; and more than 4 million low income people in Latin America and Africa have recovered their eye vision during the so-called Miracle Operation. 30 000 young people from different African’s countries have graduated in our universities
Cuba has never failed and will never to submit to the United States of America’s hegemonic and imperialist whims: We are no longer its colony, we no longer are their neo-colony and we will never again be that ripe fruit they wish to pluck for themselves.
Sisters, brothers, friends, let us join in celebration. Thank you very much.
(Embassy of Cuba in Nigeria)