President Obama predicted Monday that political change was coming to Cuba, despite efforts by the Cuban government to stop it.
“Change is gonna happen here, and I think that [Cuban President] Raul Castro understands that,” the president said in an interview with ABC News during his historic visit to the island.
Obama noted that though Cuban leadership would like to control how quickly that change would come about, in meetings he would assert his administrations’ view that “rather have change happen to you, it’s better to get out in front of change. And the government has the ability to recognize where the future is and to start preparing the ground.”
Some progress has been made, and Obama praised the country’s efforts to raise literacy rates “extraordinarily high” and its “solid healthcare system.”
Obama predicted that using the “skills of the Cuban people is going to be the thing that unleashes the potential of this place.”
Obama and Castro are set to meet and deliver remarks on Cuban television Monday. Obama said he would stress that the U.S. respects the right of the Cuban people to self-determination.
“Ultimately it’s not up to the United States to determine both Cuba’s form of government as well as its economy,” Obama said when asked how tough he would be on the nation’s current regime. “But, what I will assert is that the values we believe in, we think are universal, that all people aspire to freedom of speech and assembly, that all people aspire to be able to practice their faith without government coercion and that the proof of economic models can be seen all around the world.”
Watch the full interview here.
