Cuban reggaeton group Gente de Zona pulled from New Year’s Eve Miami concert
Gente de Zona, the popular Cuban reggaeton duo, will be excluded from the annual New Year’s Eve concert organized by Cuban-American artist Armando Christian Pérez, known as Pitbull, at Bayfront Park in downtown Miami, Mayor Francis Suarez told el Nuevo Herald. Miami Commissioner Joe Carollo, who heads the organization that manages Bayfront Park, also confirmed the group’s exclusion.
“My office contacted the organizers of the event to respectfully ask that they analyze the participation of these artists and the history of Gente de Zona with the Cuban regime,” Suarez said in a telephone interview. “We have seen how Raúl Castro’s favorite grandson danced on stage at their concert and how they asked the audience to publicly recognize Miguel Díaz-Canel as president.”
The mayor said he knows that there are segments of the South Florida community who like the group’s music but said there are also many people with “open wounds” because of the way the musicians behave. The two singers — Alexander Delgado and Randy Malcom — frequently travel to the island and have not publicly condemned human rights violations in that country.
The event at Bayfront Park is one of the largest open air concerts in South Florida.
Miami City Commissioner Joe Carollo contacted el Nuevo Herald to point out that Bayfront Park Management Trust, which he chairs, is responsible for organizing the production of this event.
“Since Saturday, December 21, we had contacted the Pitbull office and it had been clearly agreed and understood that Gente de Zona was not approved by us to be at the concert,” Carollo said, adding that he made that announcement to the media on Monday.
The contract with Pitbull’s organization, Aim Productions, clearly stipulates that Bayfront Park Management Trust has the right and authority to choose who will perform at the concert, Carollo said.
In addition to Pitbull, the New Year’s Eve concert also will feature Willy Chirino, Amaury Gutiérrez, Carlos Oliva, Malena and Lena Burke, Los 3 de La Habana, Eduardo Antonio, Luis Bofill, Karyle Alonso, Marytrini, Miami Girls Tumbao and Las Payasitas Ni Fu ni Fa.
Gente de Zona did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Mayor Suarez supports the federal government’s decision to deny funds to cultural exchange programs with Cuba. The mayor sponsored a resolution in Miami that denies local government funds and support for these types of activities.
Last month, Suarez pushed for the cancellation of a concert in Allapattah by Haila María Mompié, a Cuban artist declared persona non grata in Miami for singing to Fidel Castro about a decade ago.
“This sends a strong message to other artists close to the Castro regime who want to benefit from the bounties of democracy while supporting a murderous regime that exports its terror to Venezuela, Nicaragua and the rest of Latin America,” Suarez said then.
Gente de Zona has been a source of controversy for several years.
In 2017, a video was circulated in which Gente de Zona appeared on stage dancing with Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, the grandson and bodyguard of former Cuban ruler Raúl Castro. On that occasion, several members of the exile community in Miami asked to have them stripped of their keys to the city, which former Mayor Tomás Regalado had given the two artists in 2016.
Regalado rescinded the keys to the city honor, saying injuries caused by Castro’s regime “have not yet healed.”
The group stirred controversy during a concert in Havana in 2018 when it appealed to the audience for a round of applause in honor of Díaz-Canel, the government-anointed president. Díaz-Canel’s presence was seen as an endorsement of the group, activists from Miami and members of the opposition on the island said.
“Applause for our President Díaz-Canel who is here with us tonight,” Delgado, one of the two singers, said at the time. “Thank you for leading the population at this time, for being with the population, interacting with Gente de Zona.“
“If they want to sing at New Year’s Eve somewhere they can ask Díaz-Canel and Raúl Castro’s grandson for an invitation,” said Carollo, reaffirming his opposition to the presence of Gente de Zona at the Miami concert. “We have plenty of our own talent here, many of whom have won a lot of Latin Grammys, to bring in such people with their background.”
In an interview earlier this year with Cuban-American personality Enrique Santos in his iHeartRadio digital program, Gente de Zona defended themselves before a public campaign calling for their permanent resident status in the United States to be withdrawn due to their alleged close relations with the Cuban government.
“I have freedom to think and do what I want,” said Delgado, one of the two Gente de Zona artists. “If turning in my Green Card will solve the problems of Cuba; If you can assure me that I give you my Green Card today and tomorrow all the problems of Cuba are solved — the lights come on, there is gas, there is food, there is everything — you can stay with my Green Card. ...If that doesn’t work out, you give me back my Green Card.”
At the time, high-profile Cuban Americans, including Spanish-language TV personality María Elvira Salazar, who also is seeking a congressional seat, supported the call to overturn the duo’s permanent resident status.
“You cannot be on the side of the exiles and the Cuban regime at the same time,” Salazar posted in Spanish on her social media accounts. “In other words, with God and with the Devil.”
This story was originally published December 24, 2019 at 4:29 PM.