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The Cuban baritone and cultural promoter Ulises Aquino Guerra published on Saturday on his Facebook profile the text The Cuba I Want, in which he demands the end of political and ideological exclusion as an essential condition for rebuilding the country.
Aquino, one of the most recognized critical voices on the island, asserts that Cuba has enough material and human capital to overcome its crisis, but what is lacking is the political will to dismantle the bureaucratic and ideological apparatus that has destroyed the economic and social fabric of the nation.
"The first thing to change is political exclusion, and to eradicate once and for all the decisions based on the same ideological postulates that close the doors to development," wrote the artist.
The text pointed out that neither side of the Cuban debate, neither the regime nor the exile, presents proposals that take into account the genuine desires of the Cuban people.
"We are left with a ruined country, further damaged by ideological voluntarism and political stubbornness," asserts Aquino, who also criticized the "political deafness that hinders the citizen's right to protest and question."
The baritone rejected both the search for a Cuba of the past—the one from the 1940 Constitution, the 1950s, or the idealized version after 1959—as well as the solutions imposed from outside.
"The necessary changes must be made by you. Not the Americans, nor the diaspora, nor anyone else," he wrote. He also agreed that "a popular consultation is warranted regarding what the people want, not about what the people know you want."
Aquino also called for the construction of "a new, tolerant, and open nation" with "a government that knows how to coexist with all political opinions and positions."
And he warned that "there will be no need for bombs or bullets if they heed the cry of the people who are fed up with living in a misery dictated by their decisions."
The publication generated a wide citizen response. One commentator agreed that "there is no political will, nor honesty in recognizing a new reality that has changed so much that it left them far behind."
Another reader raised the need to remove Article 5 of the Constitution, which enshrines the Communist Party of Cuba as the governing body of society with power over the three branches of government, and pointed out that members of the PCC and the Young Communist League represent only about 10 to 15% of all Cubans, including the diaspora, yet they control more than 85% of the governing bodies.
"Stubbornness can no longer be the fundamental characteristic of our Party-State-Government," he wrote.
A third commentator proposed a "National Dialogue without exclusions for a binding agreement via plebiscite," while skeptical voices questioned whether the current government truly has the willingness to adhere to a public consultation or if there are constitutional guarantees to attract diaspora investment.
"We still have time to avoid the worst, if we aren't already experiencing it," summarized one of the readers in the comments.
This essay is part of a sustained trajectory of critical pronouncements by Aquino. On May 30, he defended economic freedom as the key to development, and on May 8, he depicted Havana engulfed in despair and called for internal dialogue as the only way forward.
In October 2025, Aquino had already denounced the state of poverty that Cuban society had reached, amidst a humanitarian crisis that includes power outages lasting over 24 consecutive hours and polls indicating that nearly 34% of Cuban households had at least one member who went to bed hungry in 2025.
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