Esta tierra nuestra (1959) - full transcript
THIS LAND OF OURS
Broad is the uncultivated land of Cuba
And clear is the justice to open it
To whoever uses it and would sidestep whomever
Is of no use to it - José Martí
Wide is the land, and generous
To he who bends over it every day
Who ruts its furrows and fills it with seeds
Who sinks into it and gives it his daily sweat
He who knows that the land is a living thing
that returns man’s work
And that in it a whole nation can find the strength to develop
Wide is the land
In it a village can get rich or lose itself
Because the land gives the same to one as it does to many
And then it all depends on mankind
He who daily works the land
Who knows it well
Knows that the land is wide and generous
That it extends far beyond where he can see
But he also knows that before him
There have been other men who have handed it down
From the land comes our primary riches
Sugar, for example,
whose sale in a single market has depended almost exclusively on the rhythm of our economy
Sugar that, when released from the plant
goes through a complicated stock market mechanism
that determines how many times a man from our village can eat a day.
Sugar
with its time of harvest and time of rest
Our primary wealth arisen from the earth
But on the land
man has also erected fences of all kinds
large and small
And each ends in a certain type of land ownership
There are large swaths of land in the hands of few
This is called latifundio
And there are many landless campesinos
This is called our people’s misery
In the field are sometimes unending fences that demonstrate the precise limits of the latifundios
Fences that surround large tracts of someone else’s land
And while a large portion of our people go hungry
Not all of this land is used as a source of wealth for the nation
Sugar companies control 1,880 hectares (or 188,000 caballerías) of land
Right now, half of this land would suffice for a normal harvest
Cattle ranches control about 3,000 hectares (300,000 caballerías)
While less than half of this land would provide for that amount of cattle
But on the other side of these fences
The people are different
On the other side of the fences
Men who have nothing must do the hardest jobs
To simply avoid dying of hunger
The latifundio results in some striking figures:
The average income per person among farm workers is 25 cents a day
44% of these people have never attended school
91% are clearly malnourished
11% drink milk, and only 4% eat meat
84% live in homes with dirt floors and roofs made of guano
And the vast majority of the rural population suffers
On the other side of the fences
Our economy stagnates
The latifundio is the reason that we spend an average of 150 million pesos annually
importing food products that could easily be produced in Cuba
That would mean work for many unemployed Cubans
The latifundio is the reason
that the land is not used in all its productive capacity
On the other side of the fences
farm workers only find work for part of the year
The low purchasing power of the population prevents the creation of new national industries
Of new sources of work
In Cuba there are more than 700,000 unemployed and under-employed
Sometimes, for the campesino to work a piece of land
To occupy land that rightfully belonged to him
must do so under the cover of night because it was land stolen from the state by large companies
It is easy to prevent the campesino from building his ranch on fenced land
However, it is not quite so easy to evict him
once he has already established a home and has worked a piece of land
To do it
the law must be ignored
But it is already known that the law in Cuba
is only applied when it is convenient for the powerful
For the campesino, happiness is always fleeting
And the simple evils have lasted more than 100 years
It is without a doubt that if the entire nation has suffered the consequences of inadequate land distribution
If the entire nation has suffered the consequences of the latifundio
It is the guajiro who has suffered the most directly
And who has also most directly fought to overcome them
These things have been happening in Cuba at any time and any place in our countryside
The culmination of the fight for land
The culmination of the struggle between campesinos and landowners
The culmination of the fight against misery,
against unemployment, against injustice, against theft, against shamelessness
The culmination of the struggle of the peasants of Realengo 18
of the merchants of Casanoa, of Las Mámoas
and of countless other places
That was going to find their natural path in the Revolution, in the armed insurrection
The campesino joins the ranks of the rebel army
And from there he will demand his right to life
The blood fee to be paid would not be little
The dictatorship respected neither women nor the elderly nor children.
7 years of oppression
7 years of struggle, of death, of suffering
But at the end the people united defeats tyranny
And makes the triumph of the revolution possible
Now the land
this land of ours, watered with the blood of so many people
Will have a better fate
No more idle land
No more men without work
No more landless campesinos
No more violence in the fields to impose the right of force against the weakest
The people are already beginning to build the foundations
for a more rich and just future
And that is called
Agrarian Reform
The land has to be newly redistributed
and used in all its producing power
Above races, ideologies, and religious creeds
The people have come together to defeat misery
And the campesino is not alone
Along with him an entire nation has grown and become stronger
Now the soldier is also of the people
And his strength is his reason
Now all will march united along the same path to exercise their right to life
And to defend it with their death if necessary
END
Broad is the uncultivated land of Cuba
And clear is the justice to open it
To whoever uses it and would sidestep whomever
Is of no use to it - José Martí
Wide is the land, and generous
To he who bends over it every day
Who ruts its furrows and fills it with seeds
Who sinks into it and gives it his daily sweat
He who knows that the land is a living thing
that returns man’s work
And that in it a whole nation can find the strength to develop
Wide is the land
In it a village can get rich or lose itself
Because the land gives the same to one as it does to many
And then it all depends on mankind
He who daily works the land
Who knows it well
Knows that the land is wide and generous
That it extends far beyond where he can see
But he also knows that before him
There have been other men who have handed it down
From the land comes our primary riches
Sugar, for example,
whose sale in a single market has depended almost exclusively on the rhythm of our economy
Sugar that, when released from the plant
goes through a complicated stock market mechanism
that determines how many times a man from our village can eat a day.
Sugar
with its time of harvest and time of rest
Our primary wealth arisen from the earth
But on the land
man has also erected fences of all kinds
large and small
And each ends in a certain type of land ownership
There are large swaths of land in the hands of few
This is called latifundio
And there are many landless campesinos
This is called our people’s misery
In the field are sometimes unending fences that demonstrate the precise limits of the latifundios
Fences that surround large tracts of someone else’s land
And while a large portion of our people go hungry
Not all of this land is used as a source of wealth for the nation
Sugar companies control 1,880 hectares (or 188,000 caballerías) of land
Right now, half of this land would suffice for a normal harvest
Cattle ranches control about 3,000 hectares (300,000 caballerías)
While less than half of this land would provide for that amount of cattle
But on the other side of these fences
The people are different
On the other side of the fences
Men who have nothing must do the hardest jobs
To simply avoid dying of hunger
The latifundio results in some striking figures:
The average income per person among farm workers is 25 cents a day
44% of these people have never attended school
91% are clearly malnourished
11% drink milk, and only 4% eat meat
84% live in homes with dirt floors and roofs made of guano
And the vast majority of the rural population suffers
On the other side of the fences
Our economy stagnates
The latifundio is the reason that we spend an average of 150 million pesos annually
importing food products that could easily be produced in Cuba
That would mean work for many unemployed Cubans
The latifundio is the reason
that the land is not used in all its productive capacity
On the other side of the fences
farm workers only find work for part of the year
The low purchasing power of the population prevents the creation of new national industries
Of new sources of work
In Cuba there are more than 700,000 unemployed and under-employed
Sometimes, for the campesino to work a piece of land
To occupy land that rightfully belonged to him
must do so under the cover of night because it was land stolen from the state by large companies
It is easy to prevent the campesino from building his ranch on fenced land
However, it is not quite so easy to evict him
once he has already established a home and has worked a piece of land
To do it
the law must be ignored
But it is already known that the law in Cuba
is only applied when it is convenient for the powerful
For the campesino, happiness is always fleeting
And the simple evils have lasted more than 100 years
It is without a doubt that if the entire nation has suffered the consequences of inadequate land distribution
If the entire nation has suffered the consequences of the latifundio
It is the guajiro who has suffered the most directly
And who has also most directly fought to overcome them
These things have been happening in Cuba at any time and any place in our countryside
The culmination of the fight for land
The culmination of the struggle between campesinos and landowners
The culmination of the fight against misery,
against unemployment, against injustice, against theft, against shamelessness
The culmination of the struggle of the peasants of Realengo 18
of the merchants of Casanoa, of Las Mámoas
and of countless other places
That was going to find their natural path in the Revolution, in the armed insurrection
The campesino joins the ranks of the rebel army
And from there he will demand his right to life
The blood fee to be paid would not be little
The dictatorship respected neither women nor the elderly nor children.
7 years of oppression
7 years of struggle, of death, of suffering
But at the end the people united defeats tyranny
And makes the triumph of the revolution possible
Now the land
this land of ours, watered with the blood of so many people
Will have a better fate
No more idle land
No more men without work
No more landless campesinos
No more violence in the fields to impose the right of force against the weakest
The people are already beginning to build the foundations
for a more rich and just future
And that is called
Agrarian Reform
The land has to be newly redistributed
and used in all its producing power
Above races, ideologies, and religious creeds
The people have come together to defeat misery
And the campesino is not alone
Along with him an entire nation has grown and become stronger
Now the soldier is also of the people
And his strength is his reason
Now all will march united along the same path to exercise their right to life
And to defend it with their death if necessary
END