After completing his tour of 10 concerts in Spain — the longest in the country in a decade — Silvio Rodríguez praised the encampment at Puerta del Sol in Madrid, where citizens are calling for urgent measures in response to the housing crisis.
His statements, reported by El País, have sparked a wave of criticism due to their evident contradiction: the 79-year-old Cuban troubadour celebrates the right to protest in Spain while supporting a regime that incarcerates those who exercise that same right in Cuba.
"The Sol camp gives me hope and courage," Rodríguez declared to the Spanish newspaper. "The world seems to be sinking into a dark age. The occurrence of events for justice, inspired by compassion and solidarity, like the one at Puerta del Sol, is uplifting."
The contradiction contained in those words did not go unnoticed among Cubans both on and off the Island: while the singer-songwriter applauds the citizen mobilization in Madrid, the regime he defends keeps more than 1,200 political prisoners, many of whom were sentenced precisely for taking to the streets to protest during the explosion of July 11, 2021.
The most recent episode of his alignment with the dictatorship occurred in March of this year, when Rodríguez wrote on his blog: «I demand my AKM, if they take action. And let it be clear that I say this very seriously». Days later, the Ministry of the Armed Forces ceremoniously presented him with a functional AKM rifle and a replica in an event presided over by Miguel Díaz-Canel.
Silvio's stance on the Cuban protests has historically been ambiguous. Following July 11, he acknowledged the outbreak as "a turning point" and called for amnesty for those detained who had not resorted to violence, questioning the sentences of 15, 20, and 30 years.
He also met with the playwright Yunior García Aguilera in a approximately 70-minute meeting described as fraternal, during which García asked him to advocate for the prisoners. However, before the march on November 15, 2021, called by the Archipiélago movement, Silvio did not publicly support the initiative; the regime blocked the demonstration and besieged García at his home.
In May 2021 —after the detention of 13 youths in Old Havana who were demonstrating in support of the artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, who was besieged and on a hunger and thirst strike— the troubadour proposed to “legalize protests” under a model of “authorized protests” with police protection for the demonstrators.
But her proposal was expressed with a controversial phrase: «Scandals will end the day protests are legalized».
His defeat between two waters led him in March of this year to state, in another interview with El País, that during the protests on July 11, 2021, «the law enforcement should have guaranteed the safety of those who were protesting». And in June, he reiterated that he believes in the right to free expression and protest, but added that law enforcement must prevent «violent or vandalistic» acts.
The Spanish tour of 2026 was marked from the outset by protests from the exile community. On September 1, activist Avana de la Torre led a rally in front of the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona with signs reading "Boycott," "Don’t finance the dictatorship," and "No to the accomplices of repression in Cuba."
After that protest, exiled Cubans requested Isabel Díaz Ayuso to declare Rodríguez a "persona non grata" in Madrid. It was not the first time: in October 2021, nearly a hundred Cubans had already protested in front of the WiZink Center in Madrid during another one of his concerts.
Inside the venues, the scene was radically different: 12,000 people filled the Movistar Arena in Madrid on October 4 for the closing of the tour, and among the crowd, chants of "Long live the revolution!" were heard.
The paradox that defines Silvio Rodríguez was summed up in the critical reading that circulated among Cubans following the publication of the article in El País: the same man who calls for a rifle to defend the system established by a regime that has seized the Cuban state —and that deprives Cubans of the right to protest— celebrates, from a European stage, that the Spanish can indeed protest against the system and its rulers.
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