Asela de los Santos

Asela de los Santos
Minister of Education
In office
1976–1984
Appointed byRaúl Castro
PresidentFidel Castro
Deputy Minister of Education
In office
1974–1976
Appointed byRaúl Castro
PresidentFidel Castro
Preceded byPosition established
Personal details
Born10 September 1929
Santiago de Cuba, Cuba
Died23 January 2020 (aged 90)
Havana, Cuba
Political partyCommunist Party of Cuba
SpouseJosé Ramón Fernández
Alma materUniversity of Oriente (Cuba)
AwardsOrder of Playa Girón
Military service
AllegianceRepublic of Cuba
Branch/serviceCuban Revolutionary Army, Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces
Years of service1953–1970
RankCaptain
Battles/warsCuban Revolution

Asela de los Santos Tamayo (10 September 1929 – 23 January 2020) was a Cuban teacher, revolutionary leader and politician. She was a cofounder and the secretary general of the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC). She served as Deputy Minister, then First Minister of Education in the government of the Communist Party of Cuba.

Early life

De los Santos was born on 10 September 1929 in Santiago de Cuba, Cuba.[1]

De los Santos studied to became a teacher at the University of Oriente (now known as the University of Santiago de Cuba).[2]

As a student, de los Santos became politically active against the U.S. aligned Fulgencio Batista dictatorship.[2]

Revolutionary activity

After the 1953 attack on the Moncada Barracks by the 26th of July Movement, which sparked the Cuban Revolution, de los Santos joined the Cuban Revolutionary Army.[3] She helped the surviving fighters from the Moncada Barracks action and taught soldiers to read.[4]

In November 1956, de los Santos was one of the organisers of an armed action in Santiago de Cuba,[5] then in 1957 transported fighters to join Fidel Castro in the Sierra Maestra mountain range with fellow revolutionaries Celia Sánchez and Vilma Espín.[2]

At the 2012 Havana Book Fair, de los Santos said of this time that:[2]

"There, in the mountains and in the underground groups, equality and fraternity, solidarity and friendship, truth and justice, work, generosity, and respect for human dignity prevailed over the mediocrity, pettiness, selfishness and prejudices of all types that were imposed by the times of slavery, rooted in mind and behaviour by centuries of colonial rule."

Governmental roles

After the victory of the Cuban Revolution, de los Santos took responsibility for education in all of the Oriente province. From 1966 to 1970, she was director of education for the Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces, holding the rank of Captain and organising the education of both rural children in reopened local schools and all illiterate soldiers in combatant study groups.[4][6]

De los Santos was one of the founder members of the Communist Party of Cuba, served on the Party Central Committee for three terms (1975–1991) and was appointed by Raúl Castro to serve as the Deputy Minister of Education in 1974, then as Minister of Education in 1979.[7][8] In these roles she played a central part in the national Cuban Literacy Program.[4]

With Espín, de los Santos was a cofounder of the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC), established in 1960, and served as the general secretary of the organisation.[9] In 1960, when sugar mills and cane fields were under attack across Cuba shortly before the Bay of Pigs invasion, the Federation of Cuban Women created the Emergency Medical Response Brigades to mobilize women against counter-revolution.[5] She was also a member of the national leadership of the Association of Combatants of the Cuban Revolution (ACRC).[7]

In January 1966, de los Santos attended the Tricontinental Conference of African, Asian, and Latin American Peoples in Havana, Cuba.[10][11]

Marriage

De los Santos married José Ramón Fernández,[2] a fellow founding member of the Communist Party of Cuba and the commander of Cuban defences during the Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961.[12] He was awarded the title of Hero of the Republic of Cuba. She was widowed in 2019.[12]

Later life

When her comrade Espín died in 2007, de los Santos spoke at her funeral.[13]

In 2009, de los Santos was awarded with the Order of Playa Girón.[14]

After the death of Fidel Castro in 2016, Raúl Castro appointed her as the Honorary Chair for the Study of the Thought and Work of Fidel Castro, which aimed to "promote the legacy" of the former Cuban leader.[7]

Death

De los Santos died on 23 January 2020 in Havana, aged 90.[1][2][15] Her funeral was presided over by Raúl Castro, then First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba, and Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, President of the Republic of Cuba.[16] Her ashes were interred at the Veterans Pantheon in the Colón Necrópolis in Vedado, Havana.[7]

References

  1. ^ a b "Falleció la compañera Asela de los Santos Tamayo". Trabajadores (in Spanish). 24 January 2020. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  2. ^ a b c d e f Post, Janet (10 February 2020). "Asela de los Santos, Cuban revolutionary leader". The Militant. 84 (5). Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  3. ^ Kozameh, Sara (October 2019). "Guerrillas, Peasants, and Communists: Agrarian Reform in Cuba's 1958 Liberated Territories". The Americas. 76 (4): 641–673. doi:10.1017/tam.2019.69. ISSN 0003-1615.
  4. ^ a b c Noriega, Christina (31 March 2020). "12 Cuban Women Who Changed the Course of History". Remezcla. Archived from the original on 15 May 2025. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  5. ^ a b Guillois, Vilma Espín; Ferrer, Yolanda; Waters, Mary-Alice (2012). Women in Cuba: The Making of a Revolution Within the Revolution. Pathfinder. ISBN 978-1-60488-036-6.
  6. ^ "As revolution advanced, Cuban peasants' lives were transformed". The Militant. 85 (25). 28 June 2021. Archived from the original on 16 March 2025. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  7. ^ a b c d "Fallece Asela de los Santos, integrante de la "generación histórica de la Revolución"". Periódico Cubano (in Spanish). 24 January 2020. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  8. ^ Lewis, Oscar; Lewis, Ruth M.; Rigdon, Susan M. (1977). Four Women. University of Illinois Press. pp. xx. ISBN 978-0-252-00639-5.
  9. ^ Chandler, Susan (1 May 2013). "Book Review: Women in Cuba: The Making of a Revolution Within the Revolution". Affilia. 28 (2): 213–215. doi:10.1177/0886109913485713. ISSN 0886-1099.
  10. ^ The Tricontinental Conference of African, Asian, and Latin American Peoples: A Staff Study Prepared for the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws ... 1966. United States Congress Senate Committee on the Judiciary. 1966. p. 64.
  11. ^ Barcia, Manuel (1 September 2009). "'Locking horns with the Northern Empire': anti-American imperialism at the Tricontinental Conference of 1966 in Havana". Journal of Transatlantic Studies. 7 (3): 208–217. doi:10.1080/14794010903069052. ISSN 1479-4012.
  12. ^ a b Pavitt, Michael (8 January 2019). "Former Cuban Olympic Committee President and Bay of Pigs commander dies aged 95". Inside the Games. Archived from the original on 28 December 2024. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  13. ^ "Vilma Espín, a role model for Cuban women". Cubadebate. Archived from the original on 26 July 2024. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  14. ^ "Condecoró Raúl con Orden Playa Girón a Asela de los Santos". Cuba Información TV (in Spanish). 12 September 2009. Archived from the original on 3 May 2025. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  15. ^ "Falleció la histórica revolucionaria y pedagoga cubana Asela de los Santos". OnCubaNews (in Spanish). 23 January 2020. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  16. ^ Royero, Ariel Ley (25 January 2020). "Cubanos rinden tributo póstumo a luchadora Asela de los Santos (+Fotos)". ACN. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
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