Fearful of the discomfort that has been brewing in society, the Cuban regime has once again resorted to its propaganda machine to threaten and intimidate the population with the criminal charge of "disobedience."
Citizens without any work or academic affiliation, who have been "alerted" by social prevention agencies for their "antisocial behavior," and who continue their behavior, may become targets of a policy of "anonymous denunciation" promoted by the repressive authorities of the regime.
This was explained by the colonel from the Ministry of the Interior (MININT) and head of the specialized investigation and processing unit of the General Directorate of the Revolutionary National Police (PNR), Rogelio Luis Lazo.
Interviewed by the host Humberto López for the program Hacemos Cuba, the National Revolutionary Police official explained the mechanism by which a citizen can be subject to anonymous denunciations, police surveillance, and even criminal proceedings in case of not being linked professionally or academically, and continuing to exhibit behavior that ignores the warnings of the social prevention group responsible for their case.
Composed of the head of the PNR Sector, the secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) in its constituency, the heads of the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR), the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC), and other mass organizations, these social prevention bodies will be the previous link to the actions of the Prosecutor's Office, which may charge with disobedience those who do not comply with the provisions of these "authorities."
"What we need is information about the person engaged in these behaviors, about the people disrupting order," Colonel Lazo told the presenter and spokesperson for the messages of coercion, threats, and manipulation from the regime's Counterintelligence.
The information that authorities need to take legal action against those who ignore the "warnings" can come through an "anonymous tip" or informer.
Up to this point, nothing new: the Cuban regime has always promoted "snitching" as a "civic" behavior aligned with the principles of the so-called "revolution". Denunciation is part of the totalitarian DNA introduced in a society dominated by over 60 years of military dictatorship of a single party.
"What should we tell the authorities?... Fulanito is always on the corner, not working, not studying. Will you preserve the identity of the person who provides that information?" asked didactic López, emphasizing that anyone, anonymously, can be the informant of the "antisocials".
In charge of instilling confidence in potential informants ("wouldn't that be frowned upon by the rest of the people?"), the host persisted in his questions so that the PNR officer clearly explained that anonymity is protected by the repressive organs of the regime.
First of all, we must convey trust to our people. As a rule, the identity of the people who provide information to report these behaviors is protected. That is a principle in police work," stated Lazo.
The strategy that has been orchestrated from the Palace
A recent article published in the official PCC organ served as a guide to the program in which the President of the Chamber of the People's Supreme Court, Ileana Gómez Guerra, and the Chief Prosecutor of the Provincial Prosecutor's Office of Havana, Lisnay Mederos Torres, also participated.
The official media outlets at the service of the PCC, the only legal ones in Cuba, have been focused on spreading this "good news" aimed at maintaining a strict control over the population: "antisocial" individuals can be detained in provisional prison until a criminal case is instructed and they are tried for disobedience.
If under the old Penal Code, dissidents of the regime were persecuted for "pre-criminal social dangerousness", with the new norm approved in May 2022 (which supposedly discarded a hateful figure denounced as a repressive mechanism by experts and international organizations), individuals without work or academic connections who disregard warnings from social prevention and care authorities may be convicted for disobedience.
In mid-May, the government of Santiago de Cuba announced measures to stop the growing disengagement of young people from work and education in that province, and threatened to go door-to-door to conduct a statistical survey.
Manuel Falcón Hernández, the city governor, declared that a comprehensive information survey will be conducted in each household to identify the work and educational situation of its residents. According to the official, a detailed report will be carried out at the Circumscription and People's Council levels, which will be forwarded to him for evaluation.
"We have some people who are lazy, disconnected from studying and working, they do not contribute and demand many rights, but do not fulfill duties," declared the ruler Miguel Díaz-Canel during a visit to Baracoa one month earlier, emitting signals of the repressive policy that is being implemented in Cuba in order to curb the protests that the regime anticipates will occur during the summer.
A month after this visit, which included a threat, residents of Baracoa staged a street protest following a day of power outages that left them without electricity for more than 14 hours.
The Cuban regime targets "antisocial elements" to issue threats that ultimately are directed at an entire society that has reached the limit of its patience with the enormous socioeconomic, energy, and migratory crisis it has been suffering from for years.
But the indignation is growing like the abyss opened at the feet of Cubans, and the anonymous informants called to snitch for the regime diminish in these terrible days.
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