Every Sunday, after attending mass at the Santa Rita Church, roughly 40 women, some dressed in pants and sneakers and others wearing skirts but always in solidarity white and carrying gladiolas, slowly walk up Havana’s Fifth Avenue amid shouts of “Libertad!” These are no ordinary women, for they are the “Damas de Blanco,” the “Ladies in White,” founded by the late Castro oppositionist, Laura Pollán (February 13, 1948 – October 14, 2011).
Before the Arab Spring there was Cuba’s “Black Spring” and Laura Pollan
What is commonly called Cuba’s “Black Spring,” 75 journalists, teachers and anyone else considered an opponent of Castro’s regime, were rounded up and automatically handed a lengthy prison sentence based on trumped up legal charges. Enter Laura Pollán.
Frequently referred to as Cuba’s most prominent dissident, Laura Ines Pollán Toledo quickly responded to Castro’s heavy handed rule given that her husband, Hector Maseda, was one of the unfortunates who were jailed. Without hesitation, Pollán amassed the wives of Castro’s “Group of 75” and along with co-founder Berta Soler, formed the “Damas de Blanco” which openly called for release of the prisoners.
After Castro’s round-up in 2003, Pollan, a Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought winner in 2005, as well as the “Ladies in White” started making their way up Central Havana’s Fifth Avenue, accompanied by jeers, occasional cheers, but mostly deafening silence, especially from area residents. One glaring exception to the hush: the times when a government backed coalition appeared to heckle and mock the flowing, bright white wave of open opposition that surges into the warm Caribbean sunlight each Sunday. Recently, that’s exactly what happened.
The death of Laura Pollán
Laura Pollán, who had several health issues passed away on October 14, 2011. About a week prior, Pollan was involved in a physical melee that was meant to harass the “Damas de Blanco.” The altercation did more than that.
According to the Wall Street Journal’s Mary Anastasia O’Grady, “Hospital officials initially said that she died of cardiac and respiratory arrest. But according to Berta Soler, the spokesperson for the Ladies in White in Havana, the death certificate says that Pollán succumbed to diabetes mellitus type II, bronchial pneumonia and a syncytial virus.” There was no autopsy.
Though Fidel Castro and his brother Raul have released most of the “Group of 75,” including Pollán’s husband Hector, Cuba’s “Ladies in White” still walk. On the Sunday following Pollán’s death, the “Damas de Blanco” took to their regular route but this time it was with Hector Maseda leading the way. For the first time, men openly joined the “Ladies in White,” as a tribute to Laura Pollán.
National Public Radio reports “Damas de Blanco” co-founder Berta Soler declared, “The Ladies are going to continue this struggle. My husband is out of jail now but there are other women who have joined us whose husbands are still behind bars, and we can’t just give up on them.”
Like a fine artist, Pollán’s influence has grown larger in death than it was in her life. Laura Pollán, a woman who made the world tremble.