I grew-up listening to news from the BBC about Fidel Castro on my dad’s Pye and Grundig radios, when Dr. Castro was Prime Minister.
Years later, in the late 1960s, I attended St Mary’s College (SMC), by which time I was already a fan of Cuba’s ‘Granma’ newspaper.
But I was not alone, as there were several other students with ‘revolutionary’ thinking, so we used to hide the ‘Granma’ inside a VOICE newspaper and sit in the back row of our classes to read during lunch and break intervals.
Some of us would later establish the Students Revolutionary Organization (SRO).
It was the Black Power era and SRO members would discuss ‘Granma’ articles, paying special attention to how Cuban students were treated and the rights they enjoyed — to not only talk politics at school, but also to be part of the revolution.
Less-than a decade later, some SRC members and other progressive-minded young Saint Lucians established the Workers Revolutionary Movement (WRM), organizing youth and students around progressive political issues and working within trade unions to advocate better understanding that there was a ‘class’ aspect to workers’ daily struggles — and that the Capitalist System was designed to keep the working class in permanent wage enslavement.
In 1977, WRM and its allies united youth and students to form a National Preparatory Committee (NPC) for the XI World Festival of Youth and Students, set for July 26 to August 5, 1978, in Havana.
The festival was hosted in socialist countries and the 11th would be the first in the Caribbean – and the first opportunity for Saint Lucian and regional youth and students to visit the only socialist country in our region.
The NRC propagated the usefulness of the festival island-wide, with much interest by youth and students in the city, town and villages, filling the Castries Town Hall’s auditorium at our monthly solidarity meetings.
We received and distributed volumes of posters depicting aspects of the struggles of liberation movements like the African National Congress (ANC), FRELIMO of Mozambique, MPLA in Angola and ZANU in Zimbabwe, as well as those from Latin American liberation movements like FMLN in El Salvador, FSLN in Nicaragua.
We were not-at-all interested in replicating the armed struggle in Saint Lucia, but instead to use the lessons of other countries to show the similarities of the capitalist system and advocate socialism as a more viable alternative.
The Saint Lucia NRC selected five persons to represent our island’s youth and students at the Havana festival, where we also met like entities from other islands (and Guyana) that we were in touch with By Air Mail.
We met then-ANC Secretary General Oliver Tambo and the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) Leader Yasser Arafat at an international gathering for youth and students at the Cuban Academy of Sciences (Capitolio) — and saw a million people gathered in one place for the first time: in Havana’s Revolution Square, at a rally addressed by President Castro.
To leave the square, the five Saint Lucians opted to tie our hands by rope to not get separated, but that was a bad move, resulting in our guide having to cut the rope, lest our hands got severed by the tight tugs and pulls that caused the pain reflected in our grimaces.
On our return home, the NRC was transformed into the Saint Lucia-Cuba Friendship Association (SLCFA) and the scholarships we negotiated in Havana started the process that eventually saw scholarships also offered to the WRM – and then to the Government of Saint Lucia after the Saint Lucia Labour Party (SLP) won the 1979 General Elections.
Back then, Fidel and the Cuban government insisted the scholarships being granted to youth and students worldwide were specifically meant for bright students of poor parents who couldn’t afford to pay for them to attend the University of the West Indies (UWI), or others in the UK or USA — but not all receiving entities applied that rule.
Naturally, the SLP administration established diplomatic relations with Cuba on August 23, 1979 and scholarships offered by Havana have today seen over-700 Saint Lucians and thousands of Caribbean students graduate from the University of Havana in various disciplines, but primarily as doctors.
Saint Lucia has benefitted tremendously from Cuba in several ways, including medical and health brigades, sports training and establishment of the Cuban Eye Clinic at the then Victoria Hospital, that’s to-date treated over 10,000 Saint Lucians, restoring and improving sight and attending to other ophthalmological conditions – including hundreds who were cared for in Cuba – all for free.
Thursday, August 13, marked Fidel’s 100th birth date and it’s hoped that all who have personally benefitted from Cuban education and health assistance – and particularly graduates now offering related professional service – will have, at least, said a prayer or offered a few words of praise, for the man without whom they would never have been who they are today.
The WRM no-longer exists, but the countless Saint Lucians influenced by it and its organ ‘Tambu’ are all pleased to have been part of the early process that brought Cuba and Saint Lucia closer — and forever.
Even with the conditions facing it today – a naval blockade that prevents food and fuel from entering the country of 11 million people and leading to blackouts, closing down hospitals and schools – Cuba continues to offer scholarships to Caribbean nations, as per usual.
But not all the Cuban scholarships have been taken-up in 2026, due partly to understandable concerns of parents about their children’s welfare and some governments’ unwillingness to add to Cuba’s economic blues – and of course, the unprecedented US pressures on CARICOM governments to cut healthy ties with Havana.
However, Saturday, Saint Lucians wishing to acknowledge Fidel and Cuba’s ties gathered in the afternoon at the Financial Administrative Centre in Castries to honour the late Cuban leader — and again thank Cuba for all the help it’s given Saint Lucia, the Caribbean and the world.
Venceremos!