The evening, led by the municipality’s mayor, Mariel Fernandez, and Cuba’s Charge d’Affaires, Leonardo Baster, was part of the “We Stand with Cuba” campaign launched by the Argentine Solidarity Movement. The campaign aims at raising funds to purchase solar energy equipment for shipment to the island.

  Enrique Elias—a visual artist, art teacher, and leader of the Moreno Argentine-Cuban Friendship Association—stated that this act of support was a gesture of reciprocity for the solidarity Cuba has shown the world and Argentina. Tens of thousands of people regained their sight thanks to eye “Operation Miracle” and became literate through the “Yo sí puedo” (Yes, I Can) teaching program.

  Addressing the audience, Mayor Fernandez remembered her experience as a young activist supporting the “Yo si puedo” program in her local area, noting that many residents of Moreno regained their sight thanks to “Operation Miracle”—both in Cuba and at the hospital in Cordoba.

  “When Silvio Rodriguez came to Moreno, when I met with Ambassador Pedro Pablo Prada and the Cuban literacy instructor who came to train us, and when we were just ordinary neighborhood activists helping to drive that beautiful program forward—we always felt that we are sister nations,” the young mayor asserted.

  “We are in the same fight, the same struggles. Here in Argentina, we, too, will not give up when there are attempts to hand over parts of our territory to other states,” Fernandez emphasized, alluding to the Cuban people’s resistance against the harsh, multidimensional blockade they endure.

  Art lent a special charm to the moment, serving as a reaffirmation of the view expressed by Leonardo Baster, who noted that “perhaps we do not realize it, but we all lived through the Century of Fidel, and therefore his legacy is a banner we cannot let fall.”

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