El Salvador Thanks Cuba for Help to Eliminate Illiteracy
San Salvador, Dec 20. – El Salvador Vice President and Minister ad Honorem of Education Salvador Sanchez Ceren, expressed appreciation for Cuba's support to the government's National Literacy Program that taught more than 100,000 people to read and write in two years.
Sanchez Ceren extolled Cuba's solidarity in a ceremony held Monday in Comacaran Village, 160km east of the capital and the first municipality declared illiteracy free in El Salvador, a success resulting from involvement of the local authorities and the community and international cooperation which is the source of the program.
Yo sí puedo (Yes, I Can) is the literacy program most used world wide. It was developed in Cuba, which celebrates this year the 50th anniversary of becoming the first country in Latin America free of illiteracy.
The Program was introduced on March 6 in Comacaran, which has a population of 3,199 people, of whom 380 were made literate.
In his address, Sanchez Ceren commended the Cuban advisors, especially its chief Aida Terrero, a veteran pedagogue with experience acquired in the literacy campaigns in Venezuela, Bolivia, the Dominican Republic and other countries.
Cuban Ambassador Pedro Pablo Prada said in his address that Yo sí puedo is also in use in Europe and defined as exceptional the achievement of the first municipality in El Salvador to be free of illiteracy, overcoming more than 500 years of conquest.
Prada recalled that on November 8, 1961 President Fidel Castro proclaimed Melena del Sur, then in Havana province, the first Cuban municipality to become free of illiteracy. (Prensa Latina)
