Luis Orlando Pantoja Veitía

Due to his work as a journalist and broadcaster, he has become a personality of culture and history in our country.

He was born in Ranchuelo, Villa Clara. He attended public school and later private school. He was formed under a Martian and patriotic influence emanating in part from the Odd Fellows lodge, from the AJEF lodge (very Martian), from his uncles, from Chivás's orthodox youth with whom he had been linked before 1952, and when Batista's coup d'état occurred, he and other companions organized a protest at the Oddfelows Unidos Lodge in Ranchuelo.

He is a professional Journalist, Broadcaster, Editor, and Director of radio programs. He began working at age 19 at the CMHK radio station in Cruces, Cienfuegos. Later he worked at Radio Cadena Central in an Orthodox Youth program with Santiago Jiménez and at the same time wrote verses as scripts for CMHX with Benito Pérez Limonta and Manuel Chaos Yera. He occasionally wrote for El Comercio of Cienfuegos.

In mid-1956, Orlando León (Yiyo) and Mario Machado (Mayito), both from Ranchuelo, recruited him to join the ranks of the 26 of July Movement. Subsequently, after more than 5 occasions when he was detained and beaten, he fled to Havana due to the persecution he suffered. He left El Príncipe through a Habeas Corpus, as he was ill, and took asylum at the Ecuadorian Embassy along with other journalists (Carlos Franki, Ernesto Vera, Eusebio Banco de Bohemia, Manolo García de Matanzas, and Gabriel Gil Alfonso, Granma Expeditioner) and the lawyer of the 26 of July Movement Alfredo Yabur Maluf. This was in 1957.

He was the first consul of Cuba in Ecuador after the triumph of the Revolution. Upon his arrival there, he wrote two or three weekly articles in the newspaper La Nación and published in El Universo of the city of Guayaquil. He directed a news program on La Voz de Guayas. At that same radio station he rented a 3-hour daily space with an informative magazine of great audience. Pantoja states that his true journalism began in Ecuador, as he wrote chronicles and commentaries about the struggles in Cuba, the situation in Latin America, and biographical sketches of murdered companions.

In Ecuador he was Delegate and Secretary of Propaganda of the 26 of July Movement and was imprisoned for assaulting the Cuban Embassy in that country along with Léster Aguilera, Rolando Rodríguez, and other companions.

In Quito he worked at the radio station La Voz de los Andes and at Voz de Guayas in a daily 30-minute program about the Cuban Revolution alongside Jacinto Vázquez, and later in a Sunday program about Ecuadorian culture. He had ties with Carlos Bastidas and was the speaker at a repudiation act in Guayaquil for the murder of Carlos Bastidas Argüello (Atahualpa Recio), killed in Havana. (Testimony reflected on page 90 of the book "Andanzas de Atahualpa Recio" by author Juan Marrero González, published by the Pablo de la Torriente Brau Editorial of UPEC in 2008).

In April 1959 he returned to Cuba. He was appointed Coordinator of the 26 of July Movement in Ranchuelo. He directed the Radio Cadena Central station. In 1960 he worked in the Provincial Directorate of the National Institute of Agrarian Reform as Head of Propaganda and administered the radio station La Voz del INRA (CMHO) in Santa Clara, worked at the Ministry of Recovery in the Capitol, in the Provincial Commission of Literacy as Head of Propaganda. He then entered the Provincial School of ORI, and in May 1962 moved to the groups that began to build the Party, where he was Head of the PURSC Commission in Santo Domingo, Cienfuegos, Ciénaga de Zapata, and Corralillo.

In the town of Rancho Veloz he was the first secretary of PURSC for one year. He participated in the application of the Second Agrarian Reform Law in Escambray (October 1963). He maintained a column in the newspaper Vanguardia for two years, was Ideological officer of the COR of the Provincial Committee of the Party and later began at the provincial radio station CMHW where he maintained some radio programs jointly with his Vanguardia column; as well as hosting a completely informative Sunday space and other varied programs. In 1966 he attended the Ñico López School of Journalism.

He was Head of Programming at CMHW. He joined the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba with the endorsement of González de Cascorro (Camagüey).

In Camagüey he wrote in the newspaper, on the radio he hosted a Sunday space of journalism and later a daily LIVE debate program, he was also a professor at the University teaching a Journalism course (1976). That same year he departed for Angola as an infantry soldier, participating in various actions. His testimonies from that period can be seen in LOS COMBATIENTES DEL MAYOR, a book by Gildardo Benito Estrada Fernández, Vice-president of UNEAC in Camagüey, and in the recorded testimony of Villa Clara combatant Israel Rojas. (Testimonies that can be found in Los Combatientes del Mayor pages 90, 91, 93, 95, 96, 122, 132, 140, 141, 145, 152, and 154 of the first edition in 2006 by Ácana Editorial of Camagüey, as well as in several pages of the 2007 and 2008 editions by the same publisher.)

In December 1976 he returned to civilian life in Huambo and Luanda attending the political-ideological sphere of the MPLA (Movement for the Liberation of Angola).

In 1989 he began working at the national radio station Radio Progreso with the project A primera hora (which is still heard) and occasionally substituted for Julio Batista on Punto de vista. On Radio Rebelde he has substituted for Moltó in the direction and conduct of HABLANDO CLARO.

He has also worked in Las Tunas, at Radio Enciclopedia, and other places. He holds evaluations as a Journalist, broadcaster, editor, and director of programs. He is currently retired but continues working, remains unionized, and performs the Ideological front of the Party Committee.

Since 1979 he has taught courses on radio journalism genres, narrative technique applied to radio journalism, workshops, etc. in 8 provinces of the country (Guantánamo, Santiago de Cuba, Pinar del Río, Camagüey, Ciego de Ávila, and others) and has received recognition from the Union of Journalists of Cuba for all his performance. He currently continues teaching.

He was President of UPEC for two terms in Villa Clara and since 1996 a member of its National Committee.

At the 7th Congress of UPEC he proposed to our Commander-in-Chief the creation of a School of Journalism in Villa Clara, with a project that was approved at that event. Currently, he is also President of the Base Association 3-08 of the Association of Combatants of the Cuban Revolution (ACRC) since 2008.

Awards and Distinctions
He possesses various medals, decorations, orders, and recognitions that are detailed below:

Distinction ORDER No. 1 from the Commander-in-Chief.
Jesús Menéndez Medal awarded by the Commander-in-Chief.
40th Anniversary Medal of the FAR.
50th Anniversary Medal of the FAR.
Literacy Medal.
Juan Gualberto Gómez Medal (Union of Journalists).
Internationalist Medal as a combatant in 1976.
Vanguardia Nacional Medal (1997).
Vanguardia Nacional Medal (1998).
Vanguardia Nacional Medal (1999).
Vanguardia Nacional Medal (2000).
August 23 Medal (FMC).
Félix Elmuza Medal (Union of Journalists).
Internationalist Collaborator Medal in Angola. 1978.
Raúl Gómez García Medal.
55th Anniversary Medal of the CTC.
Founder Medal of Militia Battalion 315.
CTC Seal.
Jesús Menéndez Seal (CTC).
Seal of the Founding of the City of Santa Clara.
Adopted Son of the City of Havana Seal.
Ernesto Che Guevara Seal for work at the Plaza.
Distinguished National Worker Seal (1991).
Mahadahonda Distinction (artists who fought in Angola). (UNEAC).
Agostinho Neto Distinction (Distinguished in Angola).
VOICE AND DREAMS 50 Years of Broadcasting Distinction (ICRT).
Recognition for distinguished participation in clandestine struggles (UNEAC 2008).
Other diplomas and awards.

Cuban Radio, Progreso, Cadena Agramonte, Radio Festivals, Caracol Prize, etc.