Miguel Fernández Roig (June 15, 1894 – April 2, 1948) was a Cuban labor leader, trade unionist, and cigar roller. He was a member of the Cuban Communist Party and served as general secretary of the tobacco workers' union.
Biography
Fernández Roig was born in 1894 to a poor family in the Luyanó neighborhood in Havana, Cuba. His mother Ramona Roig was a housewife, and his father Antonio Fernández was a tobacco worker. Fernández Roig was involved in labor organizing since he was 20 years old. He worked in the La Corona cigar factory. In 1938, he was elected organizing secretary of the (), and then in 1940 he became general secretary.
Death
In 1948, the Cuban Ministry of Labor and Eusebio Mujal-affiliated () officials attempted to seize control of cigar factories from tobacco industry workers who were affiliated with the Popular Socialist Party (PSP). They engaged in a "campaign of violence", enlisting the help of gangsters to target workers inside the factories. Similarly, the administrator of La Corona factory collaborated with gangsters and Confederation of Cuban Workers (CTC) bureaucrats () to intimidate the workers; Fernández Roig and the cigar makers' union resisted.
At around 11 AM on April 2, 1948, Fernández Roig was speaking in front of other cigar workers, updating them on the labor dispute. Suddenly, a group led by Manuel Campanería Rojas rushed into the room and tried to take the microphone from him. After a brief struggle, the men shot and killed Fernández Roig. Police recovered .45 and .35 caliber pistols at the scene. Campanería Rojas was not charged with murder; he did not face punishment until he was imprisoned after the Cuban Revolution in 1959.
Thousands of mourners attended Fernández Roig's funeral. Despite the violence, the PSP's presence in the tobacco unions was not diminished, and they remained influential in the tobacco industry into the 1950s. In the 1960s, after the revolution, the La Corona cigar factory was renamed after Fernández Roig.
See also Jesús Menéndez, politician and leader of the sugar workers union, assassinated in January 1948 Aracelio Iglesias, leader of the dockworkers union, assassinated in October 1948
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