Cuba pays tribute to Ruben Martinez Villena

HAVANA, Cuba, Jan 16 (ACN) Miguel Diaz-Canel, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic, paid tribute today to Ruben Martinez Villena, on the 90th anniversary of his death.

Because in only 35 years of life he left an admirable political and literary legacy; for his exemplary communist militancy and his tireless work in education and popular mobilization, Ruben Martinez Villena deserves our most heartfelt tribute, the president said.

Esteban Lazo Hernandez, president of the National Assembly of People's Power, evoked the legacy of the young man of deep convictions, revolutionary and anti-imperialist practice.

On the occasion, Manuel Marrero Cruz, Prime Minister of Cuba, described Villena as the poet of "La pupila insomne", a symbol of patriotism and loyalty to Cuba, leader of the workers' and communist movement.

Roberto Morales Ojeda, Secretary of Organization of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba, recalled the example of the young revolutionary who dedicated his immense talent and iron will to the struggle for social justice.

Martinez Villena had a wide revolutionary trajectory in which stand out the leadership of the Protest of the Thirteen, his participation in the First National Congress of Students, invited by Julio Antonio Mella, and later in the founding of the Jose Marti Popular University.

The Falange de Accion Revolucionaria( Revolutionary Action Falange), the Grupo Minorista and the Movimiento de Veteranos y Patriotas (Veterans and Patriots Movement) also became spaces to learn about Villena's nonconformity with the situation in Cuba.

From a very young age Villena demonstrated his literary skills and had a brief but fruitful life as a poet, his work oscillates between the manifestations of prose and poetry in which he bequeathed highly recognized poems such as La pupila insomne( The Sleepless Pupil), El gigante (The Giant), Insuficiencia de la escala y el iris (Insufficiency of the Scale and the Iris), El anhelo inutil (The Useless Longing), among others.