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Fidel reaffirms Cuba to donate World Classic prize
money to Katrina victims
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‘None of our athletes will ever lack for anything
for a decent life’
• Cuban leader honors Cuban baseball players and
coaching team
• Describes their performance as a “colossal feat”
BY MIGUEL HERNANDEZ—Granma
daily staff writer—
• CUBA is to donate its earnings
as runner-up in the 1st World Baseball Classic to
victims of Hurricane Katrina in the southern United
States, reaffirmed President Fidel Castro at the end
of his welcoming speech to the brilliant Cuban team.
According to the regulations of
the event’s organizers, of the economic benefits
allocated to the teams, 9% goes to the winner and 7%
to the runner-up.
“Whatever we receive we will
deliver to the martyrs of Katrina, whatever it is,
whether it is half a million, or one, two, three or
four million, without the slightest hesitation and
with great satisfaction. That multiplies the moral
authority of our athletes,” affirmed the
revolutionary leader, to the applause of more than
15,000 young people, including thousands of Latin
American scholarship students, who filled the Sports
City Coliseum on March 21 for a colorful, emotional
ceremony capping the historic day of popular tribute
to the valiant ballplayers.
Fidel affirmed that the Cuban
government is to invest an amount similar to the
donation to those poor U.S. citizens to boost the
development of baseball on the island. At the same
time, he specified that no other sport under INDER’s
high-performance program would be neglected and that
the country would continue with its project of
remodeling its sports schools.
He commented on “the great value
to the world” that this gesture to the U.S. people
comes at the same time that Cuba is allocating a
similar amount of its resources to this sport,
“which has just completed a brilliant chapter.”
“That is not squandering; what is
invested to the benefit of humanity is not money
that is being squandered, and our country is
creating the conditions to progressively improve in
every field, independently of how we have advanced
so much in the social programs,” he noted, briefly
referring to vital programs currently being
concretized in Cuban society.
He guaranteed the athletes, “all
those who have brought glory to the country,” that
“none of them will ever lack for anything in terms
of enjoying a decent and dignified life, like that
of all our compatriots.” He added that Cuba’s
prestige and standing “is soaring, not for being
squandered, but for being invested in the best
possible way.”
He commented that it was not a
matter of criticizing the professional teams that
our team competed against, “because those nations do
not have the same conditions as Cuba,” and explained
that the Revolution has placed sports within the
reach of all citizens. “That is why we have not
promoted professional (sports), but what option do
they have in those countries...?”
Before his speech, the Cuban
president received from the hands of Villa Clara
native Eduardo Paret, captain of a team that is
three-time Olympic champion, multiple world champion
and runner-up of the First Classic, the Cuban flag
that presided over days of glory at the competition
sites in San Juan, Puerto Rico and San Diego,
California.
Matanzas native Yoandy Garlobo,
top Cuban batter, presented Fidel with two baseballs
signed by all 30 players.
Fidel, in his turn, handed each
of the players a token “for their feat:” a
specially-designed bat, and to team manager Higinio
Vélez, a framed certificate with the inscription
“Congratulations, champions of dignity,” personally
greeting each of the coaches.
This was preceded by a colorful
show of typical Cuban dance and song under the
fluttering of thousands of small Cuban flags in the
stands, which reached its climax with the entry into
the coliseum of the courageous athletes. They were
coming from a motorcade that paraded down local city
streets to be greeted by tens of thousands of Havana
residents after being received at the airport.
Accompanied by José Ramón
Fernández, president of the Cuban Olympic Committee;
Christian Jiménez, head of INDER; other government
and Party leaders; and Adán Chávez, Venezuelan
ambassador, Fidel began his speech by describing the
Cuban players as the “glorious baseball team.”
YOU DID NOT PERFORM THIS FEAT
WITH MONEY
The president said jokingly that
the country was on the brink of an electric power
crisis, with so many televisions turned on at all
hours throughout the island. “Luckily, certain
little motors have been installed.”
He emphasized the transcendence
of the sports event that had just concluded in the
United States and the Cuban team’s performance,
which had an unimaginable repercussion in the most
diverse U.S. media, in the baseball-loving
Caribbean, and in Latin America in general. He read
excerpts from various news articles to prove his
point.
“It would be undignified to
invent things to boast about ourselves,” he said,
adding, “We have been celebrating victories for many
years, not just in baseball.”
He recalled the events leading up
to our team’s participation in the World Classic;
the interest of the Major Leagues; the initial
refusal by the Bush administration to permit Cuba’s
participation based on clauses of the blockade; the
condemnation of that move by baseball federations,
prominent individuals and even international sports,
including pressure brought to bear that, together
with public opinion, forced them to accept the
request by the Classic organizers on the condition
that Cuba would refuse any earnings from its
participation. This prompted the Cuban federation to
donate that money to victims of Hurricane Katrina as
a way of saving the invitation.
He commented on the people’s
spontaneous mobilization as a reflection of their
feelings of satisfaction and pride for their
athletes, criticized the decision to exclude
baseball from the Olympics beginning in 2012, and
called attention to the fact – among other aspects –
that our team, compared with national teams in
previous years, was not characterized by prominent
homerun-hitters or acclaimed pitching. Our team had
to face unusual and diverse playing rules, and was
in fact a renovated selection; nevertheless, it
performed a “colossal feat” in competing against
Major League players, whose contracts are worth a
total of more than $470 million.
“You did not perform this feat
with money,” he affirmed, adding that his intention
was not to criticize professional players or the
Major Leagues, or to convert the event into an
ideological situation “in any way... that does not
help our approach,” he said, in reference to the
world of baseball. He revealed that when a
counterrevolutionary placard appeared, “it really
made me laugh... they were trying to distract us,
but they (the players) did not allow themselves to
be provoked,” and added that a high level of
security was maintained by authorities at the
competition venues.
“They cannot defeat Cuba on any
terrain. Occupying this country is impossible. Take
it like a homerun. Seriously. The Cuban people have
earned a gold medal in their ability to resist...
We’ll be smiling at their blockade... We don’t need
them (the United States) for absolutely anything,”
the Cuban president affirmed. He noted the presence
at the ceremony of relatives of the five Cuban
heroes imprisoned by the empire, whose messages from
their cells in the United States provided important
encouragement to our ballplayers, as was affirmed
minutes earlier by Angel Iglesias, the delegation’s
leader.
Iglesias, who spoke previously,
called the mass reception “incredible,” and said
that competing in such a complex situation was a
challenge via which, through their performance, they
had to ratify the titles attained by Cuban baseball,
which some had questioned because of the absence of
Major League stars.
Notwithstanding the confirmation
of our abilities in the most difficult tournament
that the island has ever taken part in, Iglesias
referred to the need to evaluate shortcomings and
improve strategies.
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