March is a month of great events. First, a Team Asere that once again shakes the Island from end to end, while the baseball passion, at times hopeless, recovers the illusion. Moreover, almost without leaving the euphoria of being among the four greats of world baseball, this Sunday will be another one of those days to keep in history. Tomorrow at the polls, the vote for those who will make up the X Legislature of the National Assembly of People's Power will also mean support for that prosperous future that, against all odds, we will not renounce.
More than one will have a noble déjà vu, accustomed as we are to this exercise of democracy that chooses the representatives of the people within the people themselves —although from other parts of the world they insist on discrediting it, trying to accommodate it in prefabricated molds that are supposedly “superior”—. Men and women not at all unknown if, beyond photos and autobiographies, they have been seen these days retracing neighborhoods and labor entities to take the pulse of the feelings of those people whom, above all, trust.
In addition, what is trust in the 21st century, a time of broken paradigms and disbelief in all corners of the world? How to bet our lives on the management of a few "chosen"? The answer is relatively simple: those chosen ones are our forever neighbors, with whom we share sorrows and joys, from whom we ask for a little bit of salt or give them the last aspirin.
We were the ones who, once asked, said that we believed in honesty, courage, the desire to do things and love for the collective work of those nominated. We recognize ourselves in them and we firmly believe that they are even better. They have excelled in their fields for being hardworking, more sagacious, more given to others. They will not receive privileges; not even a payment. A deputy is not someone who receives, but someone who gives.
In their hands, we place the present and the future, and the mission of listening to each other at all times. Honor the aspirations of the people, legislate in their benefit, ask for accounts and govern. That is why a better country is also built from the genuine right that assists us to choose, and choose well.
This Sunday may not be a mere formality, because by marking the ballot you are doing more than scratching a piece of paper? May the united vote not remain an empty slogan, but rather, as our Commander in Chief Fidel Castro Ruz said in February 1993, it may be seen as "an act of conscience rather than discipline." This will only be possible to the extent that we are capable of understanding that just two crossed lines on paper are enough to assert the power of an entire people.
Five years ago, some people envisioned a rupture in that unity on which the Cuban Revolution has grown, but time took charge of confirming what we already knew here: the path continues to be one of continuity. With this conviction, we are witnessing a process of renewal of the nation's highest legislative body, with the sole commitment to continue doing more for the homeland that has plenty of challenges.
Tomorrow the vote is for a future that has everything in mind, to continue reaffirming ourselves in that certainty that better is possible. Let's vote for ourselves, for our children and for a Cuba that will continue to face hard times with the integrity of its people.