Havana, January 2 (RHC) Cuban President Raul Castro has paid tribute in Santiago de Cuba to the resistance and struggle of the Cuban people, which he said, made it possible for the Revolution to celebrate its 55th anniversary.

“Not even the best of all those dreamers, who accompanied Fidel Castro in a rally like this one back in January 1959, could have thought that we would be here today,” said Raul Castro in his speech at the national ceremony marking the anniversary in Santiago.

He said that the long path had not been easy and “it has been possible thanks to the immense capacity to resist, and the struggle of many generations of Cubans, who are the real protagonists of this revolution.”

Raul recalled that the revolutionary process was forced to face, since the earliest days, US destabilization plans. These plans counted on criminals, embezzlers and on torturers of the Fulgencio Batista dictatorship. “Cuba had to face state terrorism, sabotages and armed gangs. The island was expelled from the Organization of American States, then came the invasion of Bay of Pigs, the economic, commercial and financial blockade, the campaign to defame the revolutionary process and particularly Fidel Castro, who was the target of hundreds of attempts on his life,” he said.

The President denounced the murder of teachers, literacy campaign activists, workers, farmers, students and diplomats. The murders of 3,478 people and the disabling of 2 099 Cuban citizens.

“It’s been 55 years of constant struggle against the actions of 11 US administrations, which have tried to topple the revolution.”

Speaking to commanders, veterans and peoples for all walks of life in Santiago, Raul Castro said that the Cuban Revolution put an end to several myths like those saying that it was not possible to build socialism in a small island nation just 90 miles from the United States.

The Cuban president also referred to the permanent subversive, political and ideological campaigns launched from centers of powers to recolonize the minds of the people and thwart their aspirations to build a better world. He said:

“In our case, as it happens in other regions of the world, there are attempts to cleverly introduce neo-liberal thinking that favors the restoration of neo-colonial capitalism and is aimed at the very essence of the socialist revolution, through premeditated manipulation of history and the current situation caused by the general capitalist crisis, to undermine national values, identity and culture and thus favoring individualism, selfishness and market-oriented interests to the detriment of morality.”

“They deceitfully keep trying to sell the youths the alleged advantages of disregarding ideology and social awareness, as if such precepts did not appropriately represent the interest of the powerful class in the capitalist world. With this they intend to also lead to a rupture between the historic leadership of the Cuban revolution and the new generations, and thus promote uncertainty and pessimism towards the future, and all this is particularly aimed at dismantling socialism in Cuba from inside.”

“Under the current circumstances, the challenge is even greater as we are sure that the action of the forces of the Revolution will come out victorious in this crucial battlefield by bringing into reality the objectives adopted in the ideological area by the First Conference of the Communist Party two years ago.”

“The new generations of leaders, who are progressively and orderly assuming the leadership of the country, can never forget that this is the Socialist Revolution of the humble, by the humble and for the humble, which is the main precept and effective antidote to reject the enemy's siren songs aimed at undermining the unity between our people and the Communist Party, the only and legitimate heir of the legacy and authority of the Commander in Chief of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro Ruz.”

Raul Castro ended his speech by stressing that 55 years after the triumph, the Revolution keeps the same, having compromises with nobody but only with the people. Other speakers during the ceremony included elementary school girl Claralbis Soler, who stressed that the main duty of all Cuban children is to be better students and learn more every passing day; Juan Carlos Casanova, a worker with the provincial education office in Santiago de Cuba, and stomatology student Aylen Cumba, who expressed the support of medical students for the historic leadership of the Revolution and the transformations underway in the country.