Too valuable to the great cause of liberty to suit the craven NBA, complicit as it is with communist China, Enes Kanter Freedom is currently rallying with Cuban exiles against communism.
Released by the Houston Rockets and no doubt blackballed by the NBA last winter over his campaign against China’s human rights abuses, Freedom has produced a documentary promoting democracy in Cuba.
In Freedom’s video, he tells Cuban patriots to never ever lose hope. “To all my Cuban brothers and sisters, believe me, one day we are going to go to a free Cuba and have some delicious Cuban coffee.
“My message to the Cuban regime is: every dictatorship is going to fall and you are going to fall and, trust me, the Cuban people will have their freedom again.”
Freedom spent several recent days in Florida with Cubans opposed to that nation’s communist dictatorship. His documentary includes contributions from anti-communist rapper El Funky and boxer Yordenis Ugás, who defected U.S. on his seventh attempt. Ugás failed on six previous attempts to escape and was jailed each time.
El Funky is a well-known Cuban rapper who focuses his crusade on opposing communism. He also pleaded with his countrymen to not “lose faith or hope … we are here in the exile community supporting you.” Last year, he participated in the recording of the song “Fatherland and Life” -- now considered a prominent protest anthem and rallying cry against the communist slogan “fatherland or death”.
U.S. Cong. Mario Díaz-Balart (Rep-Fla.) praised Freedom for his devotion to liberty, stating:
This is a man who sacrificed, not just his life, but his dream that he worked his whole life for. He was working as a professional basketball player here in the NBA and for the simple reason that he expressed himself in defense of human rights, but particularly for human rights in communist China, he has been censored, he has lost his career, they don’t allow him to speak, he lost all the contracts he had.
Kanter Freedom has suffered persecution in his native Turkey and has also criticized its brutal President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who issued numerous arrest warrants for him on fake charges of terrorism.
Freedom, who played 10 productive NBA seasons before he became radioactive in Boston last season (leading to a trade to Houston and an immediate release) for a vigorous anti-China campaign, has also called the dictatorship of Venezuela on the carpet.
Undeterred, he said he believes his platform is a gift from God, “and the one thing about me, I’m not scared of anything.” He sounds like another group of patriots from 18th century America who pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor for liberty.
