By Soledad Alvarez

HAVANA – The Committees for the Defense of the Revolution, considered the “eyes and ears” of Cuba’s communist government, celebrated their 50th anniversary Tuesday with former President Fidel Castro addressing his second mass rally in less than a month.

Wearing olive green once more, the 84-year-old Castro spoke for almost 90 minutes before thousands of people gathered in front of the old Presidential Palace of Havana, now the Museum of the Revolution, that same venue where he announced in 1960 the creation of the committees, known collectively as the CDR: a system of “collective vigilance” capable of responding to the “aggressions of imperialism.”

On Tuesday Fidel Castro repeated almost word-for-word the speech he gave the night of Sept. 28, 1960, upon his return from delivering his first address at the United Nations.

“Let everyone know who lives on their block, what the person who lives on their block does and what connections he had to the tyranny and what he spends his time doing, whom he meets with, in what activities he is engaged,” were the words with which the Cuban leader inspired the CDR half a century ago and which he repeated again on Tuesday.

Castro said that these committees – with more than 8 million members – had fulfilled and will continue to fulfill the promise of defending the revolution.

The former president recalled the beginning of the island’s confrontation with the United States, nor did he forget the subject on which his reappearance has been focused: the danger of nuclear war and the threat it represents to the world.

After his speech on Sept. 3 at the University of Havana, this was the second mass event outdoors in which Fidel Castro has taken part since returning to public life in July, after spending four years recovering from the grave illness that forced him to hand over power to younger brother Raul.

The CDR’s 50th anniversary comes at a time marked by measures announced by President Raul Castro to deal with the country’s grave economic crisis.

The elimination of 500,000 state jobs in the coming months and making self-employment easier are the most noteworthy adjustments in “modernizing the socialist model,” as these economic reforms are termed on the island.

Speaking on that subject was the national CDR coordinator, Juan Jose Rabilero, who called on members of the committees to support this process and keep up the “battle” against problems like illegal drugs, corruption, lawbreaking and lack of social discipline “that damage the revolution’s image.”

Besides “collective vigilance,” the CDR committees took part in public demonstrations in the first years of the revolution and now carry out other social projects, one of the most important being the organization of civil defense when catastrophes like hurricanes strike.

The ruling Communist Party has recently charged vigilance committees with explaining to the population at community assemblies the government’s economic adjustments.

About the role of the CDR over the last 50 years, the dissident Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation considers that, aside from their social work, it has been “clearly negative.”

In a statement to Efe, commission spokesman Elizardo Sanchez said that the basic function of these committees has been to serve as an assistant of the secret political police by snooping on people’s private lives.

“It was a trick of Castro to turn the committees into an instrument of social repression and control that has continued up to now, though the cost has been the loss of all their original popularity,” Sanchez said. EFE