A debate about Cuba triggered a significant political clash this Wednesday in the Uruguayan Senate, after lawmakers from the Frente Amplio proposed treating a motion for a declaration regarding the United States' fuel blockade on the island as "serious and urgent."
The discussion led to harsh questioning from the opposition, a verbal confrontation between Senator Sebastián Da Silva and Vice President Carolina Cosse — who presides over the Chamber — and the subsequent withdrawal of several opposition lawmakers from the session, according to local media such as El Observador and Teledoce.
During his speech, National Party senator Sebastián Da Silva criticized the Senate for spending time discussing the situation in Cuba when, in his view, there are more pressing internal issues in Uruguay.
"There is within the government a kind of analysis regarding the decline in popular approval; they are worried about the surveys. What is the most basic excuse a politician has when it comes to not owning up to their own mistakes? To say the following: 'It's a communication error,' they blame the communicators," he stated.
The legislator stated that the proposal regarding Cuba aimed to distract attention from other issues. “Something so far-fetched as urgently diverting the Republic's Senate's attention to this Cuba issue is what leads to a decline in approval; they are living in the sixties, and no one understands why yet.”
He also questioned why the issue was considered a priority on the legislative agenda. “How can someone who has approved the basic manual of political science imagine that this topic concerning Cuba is serious and urgent? When there are at least fifteen departments where no one knows what will happen with the drought, when there are tragic circumstances here at INAU, and when security is a complete mess.”
In that context, the senator raised the tone of his speech and directed a message at the ruling legislators. In a video that Da Silva himself shared on the social network X, the senator stated: “Go to Cuba once and for all, president, go, see how it thrives, it’s one of the sweet fruits of Cuban communist prosperity, but leave at once, stop bothering the Senate.”
During the exchange, Vice President Carolina Cosse interrupted the legislator and asked him to avoid political references. “Senator, I ask you not to make political references in your argument and to respect the institution... please continue with your argument while adhering to the regulations,” she advised him.
At another point in the debate, National Party senator Javier García questioned whether the issue should be considered urgent for the country. "I believe there is not a single Uruguayan who could agree that the Senate of the Republic should pause for hours today because a statement about Cuba is a serious matter for Uruguay, much less an urgent one."
García announced that he would not participate in the discussion of the declaration. “I’m going to my office to work,” he said during the session.
Senator Pedro Bordaberry also criticized the handling of the issue and argued that the country faces other priorities. Meanwhile, Senator Andrés Ojeda noted that it did not seem "reasonable and, above all, it is not convenient for a Uruguay that counts the dead of February in dozens at the hands of drug trafficking to be dedicating hours to this today."
After the speeches, several opposition legislators left the room.
The motion was ultimately passed with the votes of the 17 senators from the Frente Amplio, without support from the opposition. The text expresses "profound concern and rejection" of the U.S. executive order that imposes a fuel blockade on Cuba.
The document states that the measure "deepens the economic, commercial, and financial blockade established against Cuba since 1960" and warns that it could lead to "serious and foreseeable humanitarian consequences," affecting essential services such as electricity generation, food distribution, and hospital care.
Additionally, it notes that “one can have significant differences with a form of government, one can call for another type of governance and greater freedoms, but that cannot justify the adoption of unilateral coercive measures of extraterritorial scope, which ultimately function as collective punishment against the very people that are supposedly intended to be helped.”
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