Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara Calls for Collective Responsibility in Creating a Better Cuba

In a recent interview with journalist Tania Costa for CiberCuba, artist and activist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, who has recently arrived in exile in Miami, emphasized that the task of improving Cuba is a shared responsibility of all Cubans, both on the island and abroad.

Otero Alcántara, who was released on July 8, 2026, after enduring a five-year prison sentence imposed by the Cuban regime, used the story of a Cuban nurse in exile working as a hotel cleaner to illustrate his point. He told her, "You will return to Cuba as a different person. By painting your house and improving its facade, you're contributing to making Cuba a little more beautiful and prosperous." He argued that by hiring masons and spending their money, returning Cubans can ignite an economic engine from the ground up.

The activist firmly believes that this small act symbolizes a larger truth: "It's everyone's responsibility to make Cuba a better place."

The Call for Radical Change

However, Otero Alcántara didn't shy away from discussing the necessity of radical changes for a better future. "There must be something radical that ensures the disappearance of those who uphold the dictatorship," he stated plainly.

When asked by the interviewer if a popular uprising like the one on July 11, 2021, could be that radical change, he responded assertively: "The July 11 demonstration was indeed radical. Ideally, it would be people taking to the streets and making decisions for themselves."

Nonetheless, he acknowledged a significant barrier to such change: the "civic illiteracy" instilled by the regime over decades. "We have a level of civic illiteracy, a kind of civic infantilism, because the regime taught us everything," he explained, adding, "Everything we know was taught by the regime, from jokes to eating habits."

Breaking Free from Cultural Dependence

Otero Alcántara argues that this cultural and political dependency is not a flaw of the Cuban people but the result of nearly seven decades of systematic indoctrination that must be consciously unlearned for real transition to occur.

In other parts of his interview, he dismissed the notion of waiting for a providential savior: "I don't believe a mighty god will open the sky and send a lightning bolt. I believe in hard work." He also warned of the danger that after the dictatorship falls, another "Fidel Castro" might emerge if the transition isn't founded on strong democratic institutions that surpass individual leaders.

Exile and the Struggle for Freedom

Otero Alcántara arrived in Miami on July 18 after several days of being unaccounted for, a situation Amnesty International described as a "forced disappearance." He described his departure from Cuba as an expulsion: "I was expelled from Cuba," making it clear that leaving the island was not a voluntary choice but a condition imposed by the regime for his release.

His colleague from the Movimiento San Isidro, rapper Maykel Osorbo, remains imprisoned with a nine-year sentence and refused the regime's offer of exile for early release in May 2026. According to Prisoners Defenders, there were 1,281 political prisoners in Cuba as of May 2026, a figure Otero Alcántara is acutely aware of when discussing the urgency of change.

"If the dictatorship survives this critical moment, it will be challenging because we will grow weary," warned the activist, who also appealed for support from the United States and Europe to aid a transition that, unlike other regional processes, must build institutions almost from scratch after decades of dictatorship.