Indeed, there is ample evidence of an abiding appreciation for the Cubans among Africa's poor. In one of the Namibian capital's poorest slums stands a school affectionately named Fidel Castro Kindergarten. Its tin walls are painted in bright colors with the Cuban leader's name spelled out in large black letters, Framed photos of Mr. Castro grace walls inside. When we were abroad in Angola, the Cubans and us were like brothers and sisters. Cuban friendship societies also have formed elsewhere to pursue other monument projects and to curry public favor for Cuba.
People feel indebted.
You can't forget your friends. But while African governments and their poor dependents deeply appreciate the attention, they also suffer the anger of anti-Communist whites. In South Africa, about 80 percent of the country's doctors are whites who worked mainly in big cities and were schooled in elite universities that largely excluded black students. After apartheid fell in 1994, the new black government quickly realized it had to get medical services to rural blacks and to get black students trained. But controversy has broken out over programs to import 600 Cuban doctors and send black youths for medical training in Cuba.