Launched on YouTube on January 16, 2021, the song “Patrie et vie”, by a group of Cuban rappers, has exceeded ten million views but above all has become a symbol for the inhabitants of the island who oppose the dictatorship.
Protests do not stop in Cuba once morest the communist regime and the economic disaster that is hitting the country, with its share of shortages, especially food.
But they are sporadic and of much lower intensity than the large spontaneous demonstrations which had mobilized, through social networks, tens of thousands of Cubans, on July 11, 2021, throughout the country.
On Saturday February 12, a mural on the theme of “Patria y vida” appeared on a street in the poor Centro Habana district and provoked, according to the independent site 14ymedio, “a large police deployment”. The whole street was blocked for hours, the time to erase this fresco.
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A resident testified for the site:
This neighborhood is going through a bad time, so it’s rather strange that this kind of fresco doesn’t appear every day. Here, people have many needs and food is very expensive. Young people no longer take it.”
The theme “Patria y vida” (Fatherland and life) has for a year taken the opposite direction to the favorite slogan of the Castro regime “Homeland or death”. He has become a symbol on the island.
It was launched via the homonymous song, broadcast via YouTube exactly one year ago, on January 16, 2021, by several funk and especially rap singers, very popular on the island. It was a huge success, with today more than ten million views on the site. And phrases such as:
No more lies. The people demand freedom, more doctrine. We no longer cry ‘fatherland or death’, but ‘fatherland and life’.”
“Attack and public disorder”
Most of the singers and musicians live in Miami, but one of them, who remained in Cuba, rapper Maykel Castillo, known as “El Osorbo”, has been in prison since May 2021, accused among other things “attack and public disorder”.
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The website Cubanet remember : “To the impact that already had homeland and life among the Cubans were added two Latin Grammy awards”, on November 18, including Best Song of the Year.
At the time, the website BBC World wrote : “It’s the first time that Cuba has won the title of best song, [mais] authorities [de l’île] protested, whereas in another country it might have been cause for celebration.”
14ymedio concludes:
Over the past 12 months, the song has become a hymn to Cubans’ desire for democratic change and has been harshly lambasted by the ruling party [Parti communiste de Cuba].”
Jose martin
