14ymedio – Page 295 – Translating Cuba

Out of Dollars, the Cuban Government Suspends Hard Currency Exchange at Airports

People waiting in line to exchange currency. (EFE)

14ymedio, Havana, 20 May 2021 — Without warning, currency exchange bureaus at Cuban airports abruptly stopped selling hard currency on Thursday due to a shortage of hard cash. The news came in an announcement by Cadeca, the state-run currency exchange agency, on social media a few hours before the measure took effect.

“In light of the limited availability of foreign currency at exchange bureaus at present, we are forced to suspend redemption of freely convertible currency at offices in international airports as of May 20, 2021,” the statement reads.

Cadeca maintains that the steep drop in tourism caused by the pandemic has led to a “significant deficit” in foreign exchange earnings. It adds that, to date, it has been able to operate within the established limits but the lack of liquidity has become unsustainable in the extreme.

Airports had been exchanging up to 7,200 Cuban pesos, or 300 convertible pesos (CUC), per person at the official rate of 24 pesos to the dollar. The unofficial rate has been as much as 55 to the dollar. continue reading

In January, Cadeca president Joaquín Alonso Vázquez explained that, during the currency unification process and for the first six months of this year, the agency would be able to exchange CUCs for Cuban pesos or another available currency. “Sometimes customers want dollars but, if we don’t have dollars at that time, we have to give them euros,” he said.

But the cash shortage became so critical that the agency had to suspend the sale of all foreign currency at the country’s most importand exchange bureaus.

Customers have reacted to the announcement with outrage at the lack of foresight that has suddenly caused them to run out of money. “And they’re only telling us this now? Suppose I had a flight tomorrow and had planned to exchange my money. What am I supposed do? Eat it? Why did they wait to notify me the night before?”

Until recently it was illegal to take Cuban money out of the country. Travellers had to trade in their pesos or CUCs before leaving. With the suspension of hard currency transactions, however, they have no choice but to try to exchange their money for hard currency overseas where, except for places like Cancun, the Cuban peso is not convertible.

Increasingly more and more stores, even those selling basic necessities, will only accept payment in freely convertible foreign currency. Consumers complain that, just when they want to exchange pesos for hard currency, there isn’t any.

Other social media commentators are expressing serious concern over the gravity of the country’s financial situation and are asking for the government to take corrective action because “the patience of the Cuban people has its limits.”

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A May 20th Rebellion in Havana

The official media should review the events that occurred in Havana on May 20, 1955, when the University Student Federation (FEU) wanted to commemorate the advent of the Republic.

14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, 19 May 2021 — Addicted as they are to the celebration of patriotic and revolutionary events, the official media should review the events that occurred in Havana on May 20, 1955, when the University Student Federation (FEU) wanted to commemorate the advent of the Republic with an act of protest against the dictatorship.

To make up for the presumed omission, 14ymedio recalls what happened taking as a reference the data provided by the volume dedicated to the year 1955 of the chronology entitled We will fight until the end, compiled by Rolando Dávila Rodríguez and edited by the Publications Office of the State Council in 2011.

That day, Friday May 20, 1955, from the early hours, the National Police (PN) deployed a huge operation around the perimeter of the University of Havana in order to prevent access to passers-by and vehicles. At nightfall, the electricity in the area was interrupted and the chairs that had been arranged for the audience were requisitioned. continue reading

The day before, Colonel Conrado Carratalá sent the president of the Emergency Court of Havana the result of the investigation carried out on the event organized by the FEU, where he said: “I have been able to learn that indeed, preparations are being made to that end, in which agents closely linked to past regimes intervene and whose primary purpose is to alter the public peace, as well as to provoke disorders that make the intervention of the public force necessary, circumstances that they will take advantage of to unleash their criticism, while trying to to foment annoyances and uneasiness among the popular masses.”

To answer these accusations, José Antonio Echevarría, president of the FEU, warned: “The de facto regime, fearful of the formidable demonstration of rejection that the people will demonstrate in the act of the university staircase, will try to prevent the celebration of this, using it as a smear campaign, thereby trying to confuse public opinion.”

Among those invited to the event was the lawyer Fidel Castro, who had been released the previous Sunday from the National Prison for Men on the Isle of Pines along with 26 of the 30 convicted for the assault on the Moncada barracks, in Santiago de Cuba, on July 26, 1953.

From early hours, the National Police (PN) deployed a huge operation around the perimeter of the University of Havana in order to prevent the access of passers-by and vehicles.

To respond to the blackout, at 8:30 pm a small electricity generating plant was put into operation and the first speaker, René Anillo, gave the opening remarks of the event. Immediately, the police opened fire on the hill. After a tense calm, José Antonio Echevarría took the floor and the police responded with another strong shooting.

On Saturday the 21st Fidel Castro denounced in the newspaper La Calle that he had not attended the event because when he went to the University of Havana a thick police cordon prevented him from entering the premises. “Many citizens were beaten and the act suspended without any justification, despite its orderly, peaceful and civic nature,” he said.

In that same statement, Castro stated: “Those who act like this and provoke like this cannot wish for peaceful coexistence in moments when the country is so desperate for peace (…) How can it be thought that the exiles will return to Cuba, if those who have just been released from prisons barely five days ago are already being persecuted with undisguised fury.”

But perhaps the lament of the recently amnestied that is most relevant at this time is this: “With deep sorrow we are verifying that the regime is not willing to give guarantees to its adversaries.”

So it was that May 20th, under that dictatorship.

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Six Cuban Evangelical Leaders Call for the Release of the Obispo Street Detainees

In their missive, made public this Friday, the evangelical pastors claim that the individual “can express their freedom of expression in any space.” (Capture)

14ymedio, Havana, 22 May 2021 — Six evangelical pastors have addressed an open letter to the Cuban State to request the freedom of those detained in Obispo Street in Havana on April 30, after a demonstration in favor of the artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, then on a hunger strike in his home.

In their letter, made public this Friday on their social networks, the religious figures claim that the individual “can express their freedom of expression in any space,” and mention all those who today, three weeks later, are still deprived of liberty: Esteban Rodríguez , Luis Ángel Cuba Alfonso, Mary Karla Ares, Yuisán Cancio Vera and Inti Soto Romero.

“We demand the Cuban State the immediately release of the Obispo Street detainees without legal consequences for them or their relatives,” demand the signatories, coming from the Methodist Church, the Apostolic Movement and other religious currents, while interceding “for the life of other prisoners or detainees being held for political reasons on the Island.” The letter is forceful: “A country cannot remain in peace without consensus, where the opinions of some are law and those of others a crime.” continue reading

Amnesty International (AI) also criticized last week the repression and human rights violations by the Cuban government, especially mentioning the case of the detainees in Obispo. At the beginning of May, the Cuban Justice rejected the habeas corpus presented in favor of these detainees.

“Mary Karla and other journalists, artists and defenders of #DDHH [Human Rights] are still in prison or under strict surveillance in their homes in #Cuba, just for the fact of protesting and defending rights,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, the regional director of AI for Latin America. “We demand her release and an end to the repression of the Díaz-Canel government,” she added.

According to reports from the Cuban Observatory for Human Rights (OCDH), April was the most repressive month so far this year: 1,018 actions were registered against human rights activists and independent journalists, of which 206 were arbitrary detentions, including 13 which included the serious use of violence.

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Cuban Government Will Regulate Foreign Exchange in Bank Accounts of State Companies and Private Sector

The legal rule will go into effect on June 3. (Facebook)

14ymedio, Havana, 20 May 2021 — The Cuban Government is limiting the use of accounts in freely convertible currency (MLC) of state companies and self-employed persons authorized to sell in dollars, following the approval this Wednesday of Resolution 157/2021 of the Central Bank of Cuba (BCC).

The legal rule, which will come into effect on June 3, stipulates that all operations in both the state and private sectors must be carried out in Cuban pesos and foreign exchange may not be extracted from commercial exchanges.

According to Elías Amor, a Cuban economist living in Spain, this is “yet another blow to the control of foreign exchange… The regime has set its sights on the private sector, practically decimated by the crisis of the pandemic, and now it wants to ’intervene’ in the scarce resources it possesses, especially in foreign exchange,” Amor wrote on his blog Cubaeconomía. continue reading

Last year, the Government had authorized the opening of current accounts in foreign currency for private entrepreneurs so that, with the mediation of a state company, they could sell their products abroad.

The BCC also defined the sources of income of the bank accounts in foreign currency of the self-employed: the intermediary state companies, foreign investors established in the Mariel Special Development Zone and accounts in pesos “backed by CL” with which they have a commercial relationship, “in accordance with the current procedures” of the BCC “on the allocation and use of liquidity in foreign currency.”

Meanwhile, state entities authorized to carry out sales in dollars must register their inventories in Cuban pesos and pay, in the latter currency, salaries, electricity, water, transportation expenses, among other services.

“The dollar is drained directly into the state coffers once people buy the products or services they need, and the stores prepare all their accounts in Cuban pesos, despite the fact that the sale prices were in dollars,” reflects Amor.

The economist called the new change on the island, a “muddle of accounting and falsification of economic information… The country’s currency situation is critical. Under these conditions, maintaining the exchange of the Cuban peso with the dollar at 24-to-1 is a serious mistake. Another devaluation is becoming urgent,” he said.

Private businesses employ around 30% of the country’s active force and contribute 13% to the State coffers through taxes, according to official data collected in a report from the Cuban Observatory for Human Rights (OCDH) last March. .

The Madrid-based NGO stated that “the failure of the Cuban economic system is becoming increasingly evident.” If self-employment is important today, a generator of half a million jobs, “it would be much more important to create the conditions for its healthy development that would promote density in the business fabric and generate a multiplier effect from which it would benefit, above all, the village”.

This Thursday and without prior notice, the exchange houses (Cadeca) at Cuban airports stopped selling foreign currency due to lack of cash. The news was announced by the state entity in a message spread through its social networks a few hours before the measure went into effect.

Cadeca maintains that the low influx of tourists due to the pandemic has caused a “significant deficit” in foreign exchange and that to date it has been able to operate within the established limits, but the lack of liquidity has reached an unsustainable extreme.

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The Macabre Performance of Cuban State Security

His captors say that he is in good health but they do not yet explain why they have him hospitalized. (Facebook / Otero Alcántara)

14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 22 May 2021 — Since Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara fell into the hands of State Security 20 days ago, the narrative of every second of his existence has been under the power of the Government. Luisma, as his friends call him, likes to turn on his cell phone and go live every time he wants to tell something, he does it without first writing the words that he is going to say, without measuring his gestures, full of life.

Luisma’s gestures are great, when he speaks, when he raises an arm, when he laughs, when he dances or kisses, when he hugs his friends. He is spontaneous, his eyes have body, his gaze is intense.

Since he was forcibly removed from his house on May 2^nd, we have not seen that spontaneity again. The only thing that the powers-that-be that have him kidnapped at Calixto García Hospital has done is to show it through edited images, first on national television, then on Facebook pages that are instruments of State Security. continue reading

According to this version, he has been seen walking into the hospital on his own, guarded by several doctors, talking to his doctor, and walking through a courtyard at Calixto Garcia Hospital. During all this time, he has not had access to his cell phone or to a hospital phone to call his relatives. He has been kidnapped, his friends and colleagues inform us.

In the last video, released last Wednesday night, the artist looked much more physically damaged than in the previous ones. He looked thin, very thin, his hands between his thighs, his laughter was nervous, and a tray full of food on his lap, although he could not be seen eating anything. This was part of a macabre scene that State Security insists on showing before our eyes.

In the last video that was released last Wednesday night, the artist looked much more physically deteriorated than in the previous ones

Those of us who know Luisma know of his overwhelming strength and what we have seen here, although he resembles himself at times, is far from the friend, the creator who is Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara. What are they doing with him? What do they want to accomplish with those videos? What treatment is he receiving that he isn’t already out of the hospital?

His captors say that he is in good health but they do not yet explain why they have him hospitalized. They say that they are complying with what’s established, but they display him without shame, even giving details of his medical files in the official media and lying.

They already tried to take Luis Manuel to jail under the accusation of having committed alleged crimes of outrage to national symbols and damage to property but they could not prove it. They released him after 13 days. On that occasion, the authorities pointed out his disrespect for the flag for his Drapeau performance, in which he proposed to carry, like a second skin, the Cuban flag over his shoulders for a whole month, 24 hours a day. He did not soil the flag, he did not throw it to the ground, he did not “outrage” the national symbol as the authorities claim in their smear campaigns.

At 33 years of age, the artist is the most visible face of the San Isidro Movement (MSI). For this reason, the government’s propaganda apparatus has not stopped campaigning to discredit his image, accusing him of leading a “political manipulation” and of receiving instructions and financial support from abroad.

But the government’s boundary on Alcántara has been tightened even more since last November. The problem is no longer whether he uses national symbols or public space for his performances, now they go into his house, tear off the works that the artist has on the walls and take him away by force. In this violent way it was how they prevented him from continuing with the performance that consisted of being in his living room for eight hours and five days, sitting on a vile garrote, which was also taken from him by the authorities.

This time he was not harassed for making unconventional works of art in public spaces, outside the conventional frameworks of art, such as his actions questioning the removal of a bust of the communist leader Julio Antonio Mella from the ground floor of the luxurious Manzana Kempinski Hotel. This time he has been punished with never-before-seen brutality for doing what is supposed to be art within established limits.

This time he has been punished with never-before-seen brutality for doing what is supposed to be art within established limits

After that arrest, when Alcántara returned home he did nothing but go out every day to demand that the surveillance fence surrounding his home be lifted since November 2020 be lifted, that the confiscated works of art be returned to him or that he be compensated for the damages and that the authorities respect the full exercise of artistic freedom for all creators.

The government not only ignored his demands but also ordered him to be detained every time he went out on the street, until he received death threats from another prisoner in the dungeon. That was why he did not come out anymore to continue demanding his rights.

Alone in his home, completely incommunicado and surrounded by State Security, it was then that the hunger and thirst strike began on April 25^th until dawn on May 2^nd, when he was taken to Calixto García Hospital against his will.

That is how we got to this point, 20 days in which the only news that has been had from Alcántara is filtered through State Security, a macabre filter that, far from alleviating fears, returns an image that is so disturbing it seems designed solely to instill terror and panic.

Translated by Norma Whiting

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Seven Years of 14ymedio: ‘La Edad de la Peseta’*

First cover of ‘14ymedio ‘on May 21, 2014. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez, Generation Y, Havana, 21 May 2021 — Today marks seven years since the first cover of the newspaper 14ymedio. Do I regret having founded a general newspaper together with a group of colleagues? No … not at all: thanks to this our early mornings are as intense and noisy as midday; on top of that, it must be said that this profession, defined as the worst option “for making friends,” takes a heavy toll when it comes to “thinking well of” certain people…; editorial shock is the most common state of mind… life is going to hit the headlines and at the “last minute”; the philologist that I once was has been totally absorbed by the reporter and the editor… there is no rest, there is no peace… nor any possibility of going back; politicians look at us with reluctance and citizens with complaints; the newsroom’s phone does not stop ringing and we can barely cover a part of the stories that come to us; our digital site continues to be blocked on servers in Cuba and, yesterday, part of the team “went dark” when they cut our internet connection.

Anyway, today we toast this newspaper that raises our cortisol and adrenaline, that is not ‘thought well of’ by those who would the gag, the complicit silence or the servile applause; which is a repressive objective but also the target of some words of encouragement… that has made us find the meaning of being here and now. In short, it has allowed us not to pack our bags to leave our country and – staying in it – to not shut up…

Translator’s note: The title of a film by Cuban director Pavel Giroud, translated into English as “The Silly Age.”

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No Money to Finish Construction on Mariel Housing Project

Spacious houses under construction on Almendares Street, across from La Pera Park. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Natalia López Moya, Havana, May 18, 2021 — Some months ago the place was alive with construction activity. Now, however, there are no bricklayers or engineers anywhere in sight, and the din of building tools is nowhere to be heard. Construction of nine houses for senior executives of the Mariel Special Development Zone (ZEDM) in Havana’s Plaza de la Revolución district has halted because the workers building the project have not been paid.

The site is located on Almendares Street, between Bruzón and Lugareño, in front of La Pera Park. The houses being built here are notable for their spacious layouts, large cisterns and multi-vehicle covered parking.

“Back when they were paying the workers good wages, everything here ran like clockwork,” a watchman at the site told 14ymedio. But after months of not being paid, the original building crew quit. “Like everything else here, it started well but ended badly.” continue reading

Gone are the days when the crew put up walls (at an unusually fast pace for a Cuban building project), poured reinforced concrete roofs and installed wood flooring. Now, the two-storey complex has hit a roadblock and no one can say how long it will take to be resolved.

Unable to pay the the workers’ high-wage salaries, the Mariel Specialized Services and Integrated Project Management Company (ESEDIP), which overseas the project, hired a much cheaper crew, which ended in disaster. “The workers would come, spend all day looking around for supplies they could sell, then sit on the park benches and drink rum,” says the watchman.

Non-payment of wages to state-sector employees has become common in recent months. It began when the government decided to do away with the country’s dual currency system, which has forced state-owned companies to try to get their internal finances in order. Since then, employees from various sectors have reported loss of income and delays in getting paid.

“The pandemic took a big bite out of our projected earnings for this year and last,” says an ESEDIP accountant who prefers to remain anonymous. “We’re trying to adjust the numbers so we can restart some projects that are currently on hold but we still don’t know when we’ll be able to do that.”

ZEDM’s earnings were below expectations and its commercial activity was 7.9% lower than in 2018 according to a report by the Latin American and Caribbean Economic Commission. Though data is not available yet, it is widely believed that the Covid-19 crisis has led to an even steeper decline.

Between January 2014 and October 2020 the port facility moved only two million TEUs (a maritime unit of measurement based on the volume of one twenty-foot long metal shipping container). Though company officials describe it as “a new milestone,” it pales in comparison to ports in the Dominican Republic and Costa Rica, which processed the same amount of cargo traffic in two years rather than seven.

Among the projects sidelined by the crisis are the nine units being built to house senior executives of ZEDM. Few here understand the reason for locating the project in this neighborhood, 36 miles from the port of Mariel. “Why are they being built here, an hour’s drive away? Isn’t gasoline going to be a huge expense?” asks Alfredo, a neighbor who lives a few yards from the site.

He is concerned that, given their size, the four cisterns on the site will affect the water supply to other houses in the area. “Once they start filling them up, the neighborhood will be without water,” he worries

The project remains stalled as ESEDIP tries to dig itself out of its financial hole. Meanwhile, vandalism and theft of materials threaten to further delay its completion. The growing demand for building materials also means the project (the Ministry of Construction issued building permit 130/2019 for it) must be under round-the-clock surveillance.

“They were selling me cement that I needed to finish my house but I haven’t been able to get it done,” one neighbor says. His source dried up out after security cameras were installed on the site to prevent the ongoing pilfering that consumed huge piles of sand and other aggregates before they could be used for their intended purpose.

The country has seen a huge increase in the cost of P-350 cement, a key material in Cuban building construction. In February the price of a bag rose to over 1,000 pesos on the black market and it has virtually disappeared from the shelves of state-owned stores, where the official price is 165 pesos a bag. Though construction of tourist hotels has not been affected, the shortage has led to many building projects being put on hold.

Meanwhile, progress on a building located near the ZEDM houses, which is destined to be the tallest in Havana, continues apace. Unofficially known as “López-Calleja Tower” in reference to the general in charge of military-run companies in Cuba, “it has not had any delays or labor and material shortages” reports Marcial.

“Hotels are the high priority now. Mariel is old news. Not even the official press talks about the port anymore,” he adds.

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Cuban Television Censors the Video Clip ‘It’s My Life’

A moment from the video clip ‘It’s My Life’, with Kiriam Gutiérrez in the center. (Screen capture)

14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 19 May 2021 — The video clip ‘Es mi Vida’, (It’s My Life), the first audiovisual directed in Cuba by actress and presenter Kiriam Gutiérrez, a trans woman, was censored on national television, as confirmed to 14ymedio by the song’s author, Jorge Papushi Soto.

On Tuesday, the singer went on to the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television (ICRT) to deliver the work to the Lucas program and when he left, he received a call on his cell phone. “It was the program’s assistant to tell me that they had informed Orlando Cruzata, the program director, that this video was not going to be aired on television, that it had been banned.”

“The most important thing is that they are not telling me is why it is prohibited. It seems that Cruzata had previously been informed of the video, because when they viewed it then, they told me that they did not see anything wrong with it, but that the censorship comes from the channel’s management,” Papushi explained. continue reading

It seems that Cruzata had previously been informed of the video, because when they viewed it then, they told me that they did not see anything wrong with it, but that the censorship comes from the channel’s management”

The composer assures us that Havana Noticiario was going to talk about the video on the 17^th, but finally they claimed they didn’t have time. “I guess someone didn’t like the idea of being independent.”

The ban seems to be aimed at the video clip, since the song continues to be broadcast normally on the radio. “It premiered on the radio in position 46 of the Top 100 in Cuba and now it is already in third position,” according to the ratings from the Pista Cubana website.

Kiriam Gutiérrez, audiovisual director, regrets that this censorship episode coincides with the International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia.

“I always thought of the video for our community, for all our struggles, for a diverse Cuba, an inclusive Cuba. I never had the idea that it was a commercial video, I did it for people. When Papushi proposed presenting it to Lucas, I was in favor of it. I agreed because it was an opportunity for me to reach more people, but later they told me that the video could not be broadcast on television, without further explanation. I felt very sad.”

Gutiérrez points out that it was precisely agreed to be broadcast on television to achieve visibility that in Cuba is very complicated, since not everyone has the opportunity of connecting to the internet and downloading videos.

“I would have liked very much for it to be aired on television, to reach those people who right now have homosexual, bisexual or lesbian people in their family who are misunderstood”

“I would have liked very much for it to be put on television, to reach those people who right now have homosexual, bisexual or lesbian people in their family who are misunderstood.” These are people who feel violence against trans and bisexuals, and many would have changed their way a little to think and react to situations like these,” explains the artist.

For this video clip, released on May 17^th on her YouTube channel, the director also invited Pupushi Soto and other singers who showed their enthusiasm for participating, such as Giselle Ferrer, Tony Lugones, Vania Borges and Arlenys Rodríguez. Transformistas such as veteran Orianna Sharon, “la Cher de Cuba” also collaborated.

“How many children, how many misunderstood adolescents at this time. It would have been nice to provide a little love, that’s what the video is about. The love of life, the freedom to choose your gender identity, the free choice of our life. It would have been very nice for those minutes of love to come to the family, love with respect for all forms of life, all identities, I do not lose hope,” she says.

As the artist explained to this newspaper, the video was made independently, and the filming was possible thanks to many people’s collaboration, both inside and outside Cuba. Filming ‘Es mi Vida‘ was a pending dream since in 2001 when she filmed the video clip ‘Lola’, from the group Moneda Dura, which was banned on national television because of its having her as the protagonist.

Translated by Norma Whiting

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Large Police Deployment on Havana’s Malecon and Against the Independent Press

A strong police presence is deployed along the Malecón and other areas of Cuba’s capital. (File)

14ymedio, Havana, 20 May 2021 — On May 20th the Cuban regime is celebrating the 119th anniversary of the Republic, with a strong police operation that keeps several independent activists and journalists under siege.

The 14ymedio newsroom in Havana is without internet and one of our reporters, Luz Escobar, once again has a State Security agent at her building who prevents her from leaving her building.

The same police surveillance at the doors of their homes is reported by the journalist Héctor Valdés Cocho, the artist Tania Bruguera and the opposition and political analyst Julio Aleaga.

Aleaga is also a witness to the strong deployment established on the Malecón, where word had spread among activists that this Thursday there would be a demonstration to commemorate the anniversary of the creation of the Republic of Cuba.

23rd Street starting from L Street, known as La Rampa, is controlled by uniformed police and State Security agents in civilian clothes. A reporter for this newspaper also observed several black vehicles belonging to the political police.

In any case, that part of the Malecón has been under surveillance for months, as a result of one of the most unpopular restrictions imposed to try to contain the Covid-19 pandemic: it is forbidden to sit on the wall of the seaside promenade.

In Santa Clara, the regime opponent Guillermo Coco Fariñas, winner of the European Parliament’s 2010 Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, was detained for several hours after demonstrating in his neighborhood, something he had announced that he would do this May 20.

This Thursday, on the occasion of the anniversary, the US State Department issued a statement congratulating the “Cuban people” on their independence. In it, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that “America stands by their side and seeks to support them in their fight for freedom, prosperity and a future with greater dignity.”

Blinken also said that they will support “those who improve the lives of families and workers, the self-employed, who have forged their own economic path, and all those who are building a better Cuba.”

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Cuban State Security Accuses the Writer Rafael Vilches of ‘Inciting the People to Rebellion’

Rafael Vilches was previously summoned by the Cuban political police this Sunday. (Facebook)

14ymedio, Havana, 17 May 2021 — Cuban State Security accused the writer Rafael Vilches of calling for “public disorder” and inciting “the people to a rebellion through social networks” during an interrogation that lasted for more than an hour this Monday in Las Tunas, where he resides.

“The whole time they let me know that it was not a threat, but the first warning,” explained the author in a post on his Facebook profile.

Vilches added that the agents reproached him for maintaining ties with Rosa María Payá, Mario Félix Lleonart, his friends and other people he does not know, as well as his support for the San Isidro Movement. For all these reasons, they warned him, he can “incur a crime that is punishable by 8 to 10 years in prison.”

According to the testimony of the also poet and journalist, during the “conversation” he acknowledged belonging to the Club of Independent Artists and Writers of Cuba, which was treated by the officers as “a counterrevolutionary group.” continue reading

The agents also warned him that they can confiscate the equipment which he uses to support the “counterrevolution,” an idea that provokes laughter in Vilches. “Actually, I write manuscripts that I later type at the homes of friends who provide me with all their services. I don’t have a phone. So, what are they going to seize from me? My skateboard?”

The author, who had been summoned on Sunday in relation to “a case under investigation,” said that, although the interrogation proceeded on “apparently normal terms” and the officers even told him that they liked his books, with the exception of Inquisición roja (Red Inquisition), which is not available in Cuba.

However, one of the officers told him on several occasions: “We are not threatening you, but remember that you have a wife and children. We are not going to do anything to them. But you have to take care of them, because at your age if you end up jail we know that is not easy.”

“Out of that rarefied atmosphere, walking back to my home, I reaffirmed how much love we need for Cuba and Cubans. I repeated to myself that it is worth it for each Cuban, wherever they may be, to insist on defending our right to live in peace, happiness and freedom in the country that we deserve,” concludes the writer, who recalls that this May 17 is his mother’s birthday and he has not been able to go to see her.

At the end of the interrogation, the officers handed Vilches “an act of warning and commitment” that he refused to sign.

Last year, the jury of the Reinaldo Arenas narrative contest, which promotes the Puente a la Vista project, awarded its main prize to the novel by Vilches Sálvame si puedes (Save me if you can).

Born in Granma in 1965, Vilches has a degree in Art Education specializing in Plastic Arts and graduated from the Onelio Jorge Cardoso Literary Training Center. In 2008 he received the National Centennial Poetry Award from Emilio Ballagas. His published books include Ángeles desamparados (Forsaken Angels)(2001), Dura silueta la luna (Hard silhouette the moon) (2003), El único hombre (The only man) (2005), Trazado en el polvo (Traced in the dust) (2006), Tiro de Gracia (Coup de Grace) (2010) and País de Fondo (Background Country) (2011).

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Cuba: The High Price of Feed is Ending Family Pig Farming

Alisur Feed Factory, in Santa Cruz del Sur, Camagüey. (Trabajadores)

14ymedio, Havana, 19 May 2021 — Between last September and the middle of this month, the Logistics Business Group of Cuba’s Ministry of Agriculture (Gelma) has more than three million dollars in merchandise in its network of agricultural supplies and equipment stores, as announced this Tuesday by executives of the state company which also identified feeds as the “most demanded” products.

“Some private producers who have a contract with the pig company are buying the feed in MLC (freely convertible currency) and then reselling it,” according to Aníbal, a man from Santiago who has raised animals all his life in the backyard of his house , speaking to 14ymedio. “It is one of the few options for which you can find food for animals on the street. A sack, which contains about three and a half cans, costs 1,500 pesos.”

When the ’Ordering Task’* began last January 1, a can of feed or ground wheat in Santiago de Cuba cost about 150 pesos and now it exceeds 400. “A week ago I paid 750 pesos for three cans of bran, each one costs 250, and it lasts a few days. Food is hard to come by, I have a freshly calved sow and very little sancocho is collected at the neighbors’ houses because even that has diminished with the crisis we are experiencing,” adds Aníbal. continue reading

The raising of domestic animals for family consumption has for years been one of the alternatives that thousands of Cubans turn to in order to put food on the table. Given the severe crisis that the country is experiencing, in recent months it has become almost impossible to carry out this activity due to the scarcity of the food necessary for raising animals, mainly, chickens, pigs, cows, ducks and rabbits.

In Cuba, feed is not sold in the network of stores, it is only sold to producers who have signed contracts with state agencies. But there is an illegal market. The sacks are diverted from state farms, factories or from what private producers receive each month, of which they decide to sell a part.

Gelma said that it currently has 17 centers that trade in foreign currency and that “it plans to continue with the inauguration of others, especially specialized in the sale of feed.” Although the sale is in MLC, only licensed self-employed persons will be able to buy in these establishments.

The shortage of animal feed and its high cost influenced, for example, the price of pork, which currently costs 150 pesos per pound. In February, the Minister of Finance and Prices, Meisi Bolaños Weiss, said that the Government decided to reduce “by about 60% the sale price of national feed” and increase the sale to producers by 1.5 times, to stimulate pork production.

Productive sectors such as poultry have been among the most affected by the economic deterioration of recent years in Cuba. The government objective of substituting imports for a national product, especially in the food sector, has not been achieved.

On the contrary: every year the amount of imported chicken grows. Experts agree that to reactivate national production, large investments will be needed, not only in breeding and fattening buildings, but also in feed factories. There is a general opinion that a private producer takes better care of the chickens, but the big problem that remains is feeding them.

Meanwhile, in livestock, the Cuban government intends to save a lot of money with a new project: Island-produced feed based on moringa. According to the calculations, the country spends 550 million dollars a year importing raw materials for animal feed and cannot continue like this if it wants to promote the expansion of the livestock supply.

At the beginning of May, it was learned that the Bayamo Agricultural Company and the Pastures and Forages Research Institute carried out a study that, supposedly, had demonstrated the “high nutritional value” of a national feed obtained from moringa. This product would have a cost of 561 pesos per ton, almost a third of that made with imported raw material, which reaches 1,500 pesos.

*Translator’s note: The ‘Ordering Task’ [Tarea ordenamient0] is a collection of measures that includes eliminating the Cuban Convertible Peso (CUC), leaving the Cuban peso as the only national currency, raising prices, raising salaries (but not as much as prices), opening stores that take payment only in hard currency which must be in the form of specially issued pre-paid debit cards, and other measures related to the economy.

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Russia Approved Sale of Cooking Oil It Donated to Cuba

Russia has donated 253 tons of cooking oil and 430 tons of wheat to Cuba through the World Food Program. (EFE)

14ymedio, Havana, May 12, 2021 — The United Nations’ World Food Program (WFP) and the Russian embassy in Havana have confirmed the Cuban government’s claims that both parties authorized the sale of cooking oil, which was intended for donation, on a temporary basis with a commitment from the Cubans to replace the product later.

“There has been a disruption in the production of bottles in Cuba that has prevented cooking oil from being packaged and prepared as part of government’s monthly basket of rationed goods. To ensure that people in Havana’s six to fifteen local municipalities receive timely delivery of the entire monthly allotment of staple foods, including cooking oil, the government requested a loan of 150 metric tons of bottled oil from the WFP, which will be replaced once the current supply has been distributed,” the Panama-based organization told Radio Televisión Martí.

In early May, widely circulated photos were posted online showing a one-liter bottle of Russian cooking oil with a label indicating that its sale was prohibited because it had been donated by the WFP. continue reading

The Ministry of Domestic Trade later claimed that disruptions in the national supply chain had prevented domestically produced cooking oil from being bottled for sale on the rationed market, adding that the WFP’s oil would be replenished as soon as possible.

“The loan we are providing to the government was part of a major Russian food donation from the WFP. We contacted the Russian embassy in Havana after the government requested the loan and agreed to its request,” the Miami-based UN organization responded.

“The government has also informed its public that the bottles of cooking oil with the label “not for sale” will be returned to the WFP once problems with bottling supplies have been resolved in June,” it adds.

At the end of April Russia donated several tons of food, valued at one million dollars, to Cuba through the WFP. At a ceremony marking the event, the Russian ambassador to Cuba, Andrei Guskov, said the aid was a reflection of the friendly relations and solidarity the two nations had maintained over many years and predicted similar aid shipments later this year.

The donation includes 253 tons of cooking oil and 430 tons of wheat to be distributed to 77,000 people through the Family Care System, which provides food services to individuals who are elderly, disabled, low-income or have no family.

WFP representative Pablo Mattei, who also attended the ceremony, said this type of assistance “increases the Cuban people’s ability to respond to emergency situations like the current worldwide epidemiological crisis, which is impacting countries’ food security.”

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Cubans Prefer to Pay 10 Pesos for Uruguayan Rice Rather Than 7 Pesos for Vietnamese

Rice imported from Uruguay is the favorite of Cubans. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Juan Diego Rodríguez, Havana, 18 May 2021 — Cuban families describe Vietnamese rice sold in the rationed market as shriveled, with a bad smell and little expansion when cooked. “Here we call it ’the military man’ because it comes in platoons, there is no way that it will fall apart,” Manso García, a traditional rice producer from the Rodas area, in the province of Cienfuegos told 14ymedio.

From now on, that quality will be noticeable in the price and whoever wants to put a better product in the pot will have to scratch their pocket. A pound of imported rice from Vietnam will cost 7 pesos, while that which comes from Brazil, Uruguay or Argentina will go up to 10 pesos.

“The population, in practice, distinguishes the quality of rice, based on its origin of production, recognizing as the best quality that from the area of America,” reported the State newspaper Granma this Monday. In addition, during this month one pound of rice will be sold per person “in addition to the regulated quota.” continue reading

The official newspaper, which reproduces a text by Invasor, explains that “although it is true that not all of us could determine with the naked eye whether imported rice has 15% broken (Vietnamese) or 4% (Brazilian, Uruguayan), several consumers interviewed say they gladly pay the difference, because, indeed, the quality when cooked is superior.”

Manso García grew rice in wild lands for decades. “I would go out, to open country and plant it there, hoping that no one would steal it from me at night when I had to go home to sleep.” But, even those clandestine times are a thing of the past. “It no longer makes sense, there is not enough rain and people no longer value Creole rice,” he laments.

With time and the lack of national production, imported rice for the rationed market was gaining ground, but the local taste and the parameters to measure it remain the same. “The rice has to be shelled in most Cuban recipes, be it simply white, congris and even those mixed with meats, they like it more if the grain is distinguished”, says Alexander Flores, a young chef who until the pandemic began was an assistant chef in a Havana paladar (private restaurant).

“When the rice does not work, all the food seems bad to you,” he acknowledges. “People evaluate the entire menu based on the rice and it shouldn’t be that way, but the culinary culture has narrowed so much in this country that this product has become the standard for evaluating any restaurant.”

The situation is not much different inside the homes, although the standards are not so commercially high. “Vietnam is sending us the worst, I have no doubt that they have good rice, but I no longer want to buy when they tell me that it is from ’that friendly country’,” says a retiree from the La Timba neighborhood in Havana.

“It is a mud and it smells bad,” he alleges. “At other times it would not be so serious, because one could mix it with better things, but now my family eats rice with sauce or rice with bouillon cubes several times a week, and if the base is not good they are still hungrier.”

Uruguayan rice enjoys better opinions. Without trying, the small South American country has managed to fit into the complex ecosystem of grains in Cuba where some traditional recipes are very demanding with the way in which the grain should be cooked. “This is the last straw, in Uruguay they harvest Cuban rice,” jokes Manso García.

In their house in Rhodes, because of the flies, they have spent months “opting for the sweet potato and taro” that they plant in the backyard and in the clandestine lands that they borrow from Mother Nature. “Rice makes your food, but if it does not cook well, it will be unfortunate for you. For that, it is better to go for the vegetables.”

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The Power is Back On But Cubans Remain Concerned About Blackouts

After the breakdowns in the thermoelectric plants, the Government took drastic measures such as stopping work in ‘non-essential’ companies and institutions. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 17 May 2021 — The faults in the thermoelectric plants that, according to the authorities, caused the blackouts reported throughout the island last week, have now been repaired. “The electrical workers worked hard to solve the breakdowns in several plants in the country and achieve stability in power generation,” the State newspaper Granma published this Monday.

Specifically, the official newspaper details a failure at the Antonio Guiteras de Matanzas Thermoelectric Power Plant, “where the technical staff took less than 24 hours to resolve the break in the boiler feed valve.”

At the same time, however, the note says that “the task was not easy”: “Identifying the causes, repairing the breakdown and carrying out the checks always requires tireless work, expensive resources and initiatives from the operators.”

There were also failures, says Granma , at the Santa Cruz del Norte plant in Mayabeque province.

Despite the insistence of the official press, the power outages continue. This same Monday, the independent journalist Iliana Hernández reported a blackout of minutes in the town of Cojímar, in the capital’s municipality of Habana del Este. continue reading

Last Friday, and after hundreds of complaints on social networks by users, the authorities said that these faults, “together with other effects on the national electricity system,” were the origin of the service interruptions.

Directives from the Ministry of Energy and Mines announced on the Roundtable TV program last Friday that the blackouts, which they avoided referring to with this name, could increase over the weekend, before which the Government took drastic measures such as stopping work in companies and institutions “that do not provide essential services to the population.”

Before that program, the explanation given by the Cuban Electricity Union (UNE) was vague. On Friday morning, an operator of the customer service number explained to this newspaper that “there was a deficiency in the demand for power for electricity service.” When asked if there is a lack of oil to produce the current, she hung up the phone.

The power cuts were especially annoying on this occasion because, in several areas of Havana, they coincided with problems in the water supply also due to repairs in the hydraulic networks.

In addition, in the country’s markets the shortages are so deep that some Internet users were concerned because the little food they had been able to get was at risk of spoiling due to the lack of refrigeration.

Many wondered about the causes of these blackouts because whenever they occur, they bring to the minds of Cubans the interruptions during the Special Period that lasted up to 12 hours and that became part of life in the 90s. Those who knew that time cannot avoid thinking that it can return.

Journalist Abraham Jiménez Enoa summarized the situation on his Facebook account. “A friend [tells me] that it’s a meltdown. How is it possible that in a country one gets up on Saturday at 8 in the morning and does not have electricity, water, bread (ad infinitum),” he wrote. “What kind of country is this? This is not even a country anymore, I told him.”

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Cuban Government Seeks to Apply ‘Neoliberal Recipes’ to Retirees

Returning to work after retirement will be voluntary, but since it is an economic improvement, Cubans without family assistance will be pushed more to take advantage of it. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 14 May 2021 — Cuba’s “new socioeconomic strategy to face the global crisis” increasingly resembles what the Havana regime calls neoliberalism. The reward for delaying the retirement age is one of the most recurrent recipes in capitalist societies to resolve the imbalance in public accounts caused by an aging population while taking advantage of the improvements in life expectancy and quality of life.

In recent years, this strategy has advanced across Europe. Just a month ago, Spain, one of the oldest countries in the world, advanced a measure to stimulate the delay in retirement: a check for 12,000 euros for those who wish to continue working after 66, the minimum age to retire in that country.

Cuba seems to have found, in these recipes, theoretically incompatible with the communist ideology, its salvation with the approval of a Decree Law published last week in which retirees are invited to return to work with economic incentives. continue reading

To date, to calculate the pension or retirement a limit of up to 90% of the average salary has been established. “With the application of this Decree Law 36, this changes if the interested party remains for five years after their reinstatement,” explains the official press.

On the one hand, those of retirement age have the right to receive, in general, salary and retirement jointly. Also, when the time comes to retire, their retirement pay will be increased by 2%.

Virginia Marlén García Reyes, general director of the National Institute of Social Security (Inass), told the official press that there is “avidity” among managers to implement the rule. In addition, he pointed out that the authorities intend to “make the procedures more flexible.” With the new rule, retirees may be hired again, even in the same position they held when they retired.

But, as usual, the majority of citizens do not find advantages in the proposal. Eduardo Moreno, 67, a resident of Old Havana, considers the “invitation” “an abuse” and “a lack of respect” for all those who for years worked for the State. “I spent 45 years working as a civil servant in a ministry, it was hard, very hard, and now I want to be at home with the grandchildren,” he says.

The fear, among some of those consulted, is that, in the midst of the economic and social crisis that Cuba is experiencing, there will be older people who will be forced to accept the proposal out of necessity.

“Everything is painted very nicely in the newspaper but with the prices as they are now, even if you have three salaries you cannot buy the basics you need. A friend of mine says that it suits her, but also because she lives alone and has no-one to help her, they are going to take advantage of those people. What they need to do is raise their pensions,” says Georgina, age 51. The woman, a resident of the Plaza de la Revolución municipality, is still able to work but does not even consider doing so after what is necessary. “They don’t think of people like me,” she says, adding that she will stay at home even if the country “is falling apart.”

Adriana Ramírez is retired, but at 62 she is not thinking about going back to work either. “I worked 35 years dispatching behind a counter and now I want to rest even though I don’t have the wherewithal. I have my son and a nephew who help me a lot and I can afford to say (to the Government), roundly, No. Unfortunately, there are many whose only economic support is their pension [she makes a gesture with her hand expressing how small these are] and they will have to think twice before refusing.”

“The young people are all leaving because of the lack of opportunities and now they want to exploit us to the last,” adds Ramírez, a resident of Nuevo Vedado. The problem of emigration from Cuba joins the imbalance between births and deaths, aggravated by the pandemic. In 2020, the number of deaths exceeded the number of births, 105,000 children were born and 111,000 people died, and demographers believe the trend will continue.

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