Category: AUTHORS

Much Remains to be Done / Amado Calixto Gammalame, Cuban Law Association

By Amado Calixto Gammalame

Although racism in Cuba began to decline during the wars of independence, by the obvious presence of blacks and mulattoes among the mambises (Cuban guerrillas), that was only a beginning. Much remains to be done, after more than twelve years into the 21st Century.

The idea of a characteristic or distinctiveness of a particular social group in relation to its ethnic origin has been the core factor for the onset of prejudices and attitudes that prevent a more just and comprehensive understanding of the problem from a historical, economic, and social point of view.

On the subject much has been said, but in practice little has been done, the most commendable in my view being what is endorsed by Articles 41 and 42 of the Constitution of the Republic: “(41) All citizens have equal rights and are subject to the same duties. (42) Discrimination based on race, skin color, sex, national origin, religious beliefs or any other offense against human dignity is forbidden and is punishable by law.“

But from there to everyday life is a long stretch, as is often found in the judgments of inferiority and marginality lurking in the minds of many people in relation to blacks, including the judgment of those who make the major decisions in the country, even though from time to time to they recognize it.

Just look, for example, at the contrast between the ethnic composition of the representatives of the Cuban diplomatic corps, either to represent us in Burundi, Burkina Faso and Togo, and the students of the Institute of International Relations (future diplomats), or between the current leadership of the so-called top-tier management, and the mass of black intellectuals, formed by the system itself, with the same qualifications, displaying the first condition that one must have to occupy such positions: being a member of the only party allowed in Cuba.

It is not my style to compare our small country with others, but since there is already talk of a generational shift, I ask two questions that relate to the topic: Will there be a black president in Cuba like there is in the United States? Will it be a black woman? Nobody panic, I’m just fantasizing.

11 September 2013

Violence in Cuba: People’s Helplessness and Protection of Power / Miriam Celaya

Havana Police. Photo OLPL

It was Saturday morning at ten-thirty, and was out with my oldest grandson. I was driving our old little car down a street in Central Havana as we turned a corner and I had to stop. On the left side of the street, a van parked at the curb was taking up a lot of room, while in the left lane, in the middle of the intersection, a young man was having an animated conversation with a girl, blocking my way.  Since I thought that maybe they were too absorbed in their talk to notice that I wanted to proceed where they were standing, I blew the horn once. The young man glared at me, clearly annoyed at my interruption and immediately, without moving an inch, continued with his talk.

I insisted then, blowing the horn once again, and he turned to me, gesticulating angrily, and cursing me out. His face was irate, and, to my surprise, he challenged me to get out of the car. I didn’t even have time to be scared and couldn’t believe such an irrational and unexpected situation. My grandson was terrified, pressed against the back seat, while the girl tried to grab the young man by the arm, in an effort to get him over to the other sidewalk. I finally had enough space for my little car to move and continued on our way. If the girl had not intervened, the young man would have hit me, even with my grandson watching. I would have been helpless in the middle of the street.

“Grandma, who was that man? Why did he want to hit you?” The kid asked, still overwhelmed by the event. “I don’t know who it was. I’m sure he was a little crazed and mistook me for someone else.” I did not know how.to explain to my grandson why a 20-something total stranger had become so violent in a matter of seconds when I had not offended him at all and he did not have the slightest reason to act in such a way. Nor could I explain to him that the brief episode was just a sample of the level of violence that is reaching Cuban society, particularly in the capital, manifesting itself in an increasing spiral of aggression between individuals and groups for the most insignificant reasons, most often without any reason.

Almost every day one hears of assaults, burglaries, knives fights, murders. The news of the attacks seem endless and events happen daily and in the most dissimilar places. Recently, a woman was beheaded by a subject in a moving public taxi in a Vedado-La Palma route in the presence of other passengers, including a child. A few days ago, three men were attacked by a youth gang in Mulgoba, In the Boyeros area, leaving one dead of a stab wound and another one hurt of several fractures as a result of the beating.

At a bus stop, a young man mortally stabbed a family man who was out with his wife and children, simply because the victim claimed his place on line, which happened to be just in front of that of the attacker. Another bus driver was assaulted by a passenger who refused to pay his fare, and had to be helped by another driver of a bus that stopped at the same bus stop. Another bus driver from Guanabo was also attacked with a knife by an irate passenger who did not want to pay for his fare. The driver had to stop at the village clinic for treatment. It is a fact that buses are potentially among the most prone to violence in the capital.

Central Havana. Photo OLPL

A street in downtown Havana. Photo OLPL

The list of violent events becomes endless and it’s growing. One could almost say that each municipality in Havana is competing for the highest crime rate and, unfortunately, they all seem determined to reach the first place. At the same time, the impunity of criminals and the police inaction are staggering, so the feeling of insecurity among the population is intensifying. Many people say that they fear going out because of the possibility of becoming victims of the violence that has become commonplace.

Testimonies of knife assaults abound. It would seem that the law of the jungle has descended on our streets and that the strong and warlike elements are taking over, displacing decency and imposing terror among peaceful people.

The accumulation of frustration, poverty, marginalization and lack of a social project that would afford the population a modicum of prosperity, coupled with widespread corruption, even the very law enforcement for public order favor the emergence of the worst scenarios in a nation already marked by polarization, deep social differences and exclusions.

Marginal sectors, increasingly prone to violence, are marking the symbol of the system’s social decay, pointing to a spiral of unpredictable consequences if the situation doesn’t get under control. There are already decent people who have made the decision to acquire self-defense weapons of various origins and nature to defend themselves in case of aggression, whether in the streets or in their own homes. Violence as protection against violence, violence in response, as social code. I can’t think of anything worse that could happen.

The authorities are clueless. The official press continues its praises of the system, depicting an imaginary Cuba where only flourishing cooperatives exist, model hospitals where the best specialists in the world save the lives of children and all the sick poor people that in other countries would not stand the slightest chance to survive or to undergo surgery, or where schools are getting ready for the start of a new year which, incidentally, future criminals will also attend. Because this is also a revolutionary achievement: there might be many illiterate delinquents in the world, but not a one of them is Cuban. I have not heard of any of these violent acts where the police have had an important role, protecting “the public” or capturing the wrongdoer.

In fact, right now I can’t recall a single event in which the police have been even near the conflict. Most of the evidence I have collected reflect the tremendous distrust and suspicion of the population in relation to the euphemistically called “law enforcement”. Chances are that while the crimes are taking place, uniformed law enforcement entities may be supporting agents of State Insecurity whose job seems to be cracking down and trying to uselessly intimidate peaceful opponents, with that other form of selective violence, and making use of police vehicles not in the pursue of muggers and troublemakers who sow fear in society, but to carry away those who are dreaming of and working toward a better Cuba.

However, it appears that in a few years we will have more scientists in the Ministry responsible for these matters of internal order. This Sunday September 1st, Juventud Rebelde published a report (Orgullosos de servir a la sociedad, by Ana María Domínguez Cruz), which reported that students from the thirteenth detachment of cadets of the Ministry of the Interior (MININT) composed of 400 young people across the country of which 250 belong to districts in the capital, have served their period of “preliminary military training” before being injected into university careers, such as Journalism, Psychology, Law, Computer and Medical Sciences, among other specialties not related to Agronomy or any of the technical schools or offices the General-President so much endorses as the most necessary for the country. With these cadets, states the report, “the ranks of MININT will be fed by educated and committed professionals”.  We already know on which side the commitment rests.

There is nothing to hope for. The press does not reflect what is happening in Cuba in real life: Everything seems to be fine with the country and the news about the assaults and crime is no more than rumors of those who want to damage the revolution’s image and create an opinion state that is adverse to the system. Everything indicates that the blue-uniformed police are not going to be more efficient and are not going to improve the social order and public peace, but we are certainly going to have more well-educated and learned MININT with the assigned task of pursuing and harassing anything that threatens the political power. That’s too bad for everyone.

Translated by Norma Whiting

2 September 2013

Generals Sharpening The Teeth Over the Burial of Castro-ism / Luis Cino

HAVANA, Cuba, September, Luis Cino, www.cubanet.org — Those who restored capitalism in Russia rose from the ranks of the Communist nomenklatura. High-level bureaucrats, officials and generals made immense fortunes appropriating the assets of the state during the process of economic privatization that led to the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The cases of Roman Abramovich and Mikhail Khodorkovsky, former comrades turned multi-millionaires, are two such examples.

It is possible that something similar could happen if Castro-ism has a soft landing, as seems likely to happen, and is transformed into something else which, by virtue of being different, will be less bad in terms of public well-being and political freedoms.

But what could also happen is that, as apparatchiks and generals start filing their teeth over the prospect of burying Castro-ism, the Helms-Burton Act could prevent them from diggings its grave.

According to Title III of the law, which deals with protection of property rights of American nationals, the assets expropriated after Fidel Castro’s revolution — including those of Cuban exiles who have acquired American citizenship — would have to be returned by any government that succeeds the current regime as a condition for American diplomatic recognition and a lifting of the embargo.

After property is returned and people are compensated, it is quite possible that very little of the loot will be left over for “the corrupt bureaucrats, whose jobs were secured through calculation and opportunism, who use their positions to accumulate fortunes, betting on an eventual demise of the revolution,” as General Raúl Castro put it in an address to the National Assembly of People’s Power in December, 2011.

This is the idea the government would like to plant among its supporters who are hoping for the grand prize and Putinism in the tropics. It wants to convince them that burying Castro-ism is not in their interests, that they would be better off digging in, remaining loyal, being satisfied with what they already have and what they can steal. It wants to convince them that they should never exaggerate, that they should play dumb lest the General Accounting Office nab them.

But the chiefs do not have to go along. The players who want to break open the capitalist piñata at the expense of the state know all too well the risks they face. And the possibilities as well. They even know where to stretch their feet and put their hands. Accustomed to shady deals and a shopkeeper’s economy, they are patient, astute and make do with what they can steal… for now. They have begun accumulating capital, knowledge and relationships. After dealing with them for so long, many foreign entrepreneurs prefer to deal with them over the good guys, even if they completely lack the know-how. These players have neither class nor moral scruples but they do have a strong hand, which allows them to maintain order and get Cubans to work like slaves without complaint.

The Helms Burton Act placates the most hard-line exile factions and serves the Castro regime by allowing it to portray itself as the victim. It is not, however, of much concern to today’s players, who hope to be tomorrow’s oligarchs. In a post-Castro scenario this law will be almost pointless. Events, once they are set in motion, will make it irrelevant.  And then the players will be the mafiosi of the piñata, ready to parachute into any given situation with anyone who presents himself. But they will not exactly be working as doormen, security screeners or bodyguards. They know, of course, they will not be able to afford multi-million dollar yachts, real estate in La Luna or mansions in Silicon Valley. They are not fools. Their aspirations are more modest. They better than anyone know in what state they have left the country.

By Luis Cino — luicino2012@gmail.com

From Cubanet

9 September 2013

Politically Correct / Fernando Damaso

Photo by Rebeca

The yellow ribbon tied to an oak tree, while waiting for the return of a loved one temporarily absent, is a beautiful and touching American tradition, which speaks volumes for the values of this people. Why then, has the consideration of their use in Cuba this coming September 12th, caused such an outcry among Cubans here and over there? It turns out this call has a faulty origin: it is made by an ex-spy who has served his sentence, in support of four others who are still serving theirs, and are in prison in the United States. This unmasks the political intention hidden behind a faked humanism, which is nothing more than trying to obtain through emotional means, what has not been obtained through legal means: the release of the four. It happens that most will not accept a pig in a poke.

Cuba is indeed a country where the authorities have tried, and in many cases have succeeded, in deleting their national traditions. Where does this come from now to introduce traditions and, moreover, from the country considered the eternal enemy?

It is good to remember that, by government dispositions, traditions were abolished, such as Christmas Eve (December 24), Christmas (December 25), the Epiphany (January 6), the anniversary of the Republic (May 20), Easter and other religious traditions. In addition, the Feast of New Year (December 31) and New Year (January 1), were stripped of their original meaning, and given political connotations: the eve and the triumph of the Revolution.

If that was not enough, the Carnival of Havana, one of the most internationally recognized, along with that of Venice, Rio de Janeiro and Mardi Gras, lost its roots and popular essence and became a grotesque official caricature of what had been. Even the symbols were banned, banishing Santa Claus (also imported from the neighboring North), and the old man with the scythe over his shoulder, representing the year that was, and the baby in diapers, the one that is arriving.

Of these, so far, for circumstantial conveniences with the Church, only Christmas (December 25) has been restored along with, and for the same reason, some activities related to the Virgin of Charity del Cobre and Easter.

Everything they abolished was done against the will and the feelings of the majority of the people, without consulting with them. These are the reasons why the average Cuban, although having by driven, for years, by the syndrome of the flock and acting in line with it, trying not to lose his social crumbs, within himself rejects this new political imposition disguised as noble sentiment, forcing him to do something he doesn’t want, with the sole purpose of being considered politically correct by the authorities. Is it worth it?

9 September 2013

More than 200 UNPACU dissidents visit the Virgin of Charity / UNPACU

More than 200 Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU) activists joined 57 Ladies in White on 8 September 2013 on a visit to the Sanctuary of the Virgin of Charity of Cobre in Santiago de Cuba, on the 401st anniversary of her appearance. They asked her for freedom and democracy for Cuba.

Translator’s note: This un-subtitled video of human rights activists, openly demonstrating with their fingers making L’s for Liberty, refutes the idea (among some) that there are only a few, mostly Havana-based, Cubans willing to publicly stand up for their rights.

8 September 2013

Reservoirs Overflow While Farms Lack Water / Osmar Laffita Rojas

HAVANA, Cuba , September, www.cubanet.org – In Cuba there are 242 reservoirs, administered by the Institute of Hydraulic Resources (INRH). Together, these reservoirs can accumulate 9 billion cubic meters of water. Not to mention hundreds of small dams belonging to the Ministry of Agriculture and Sugar (AZCUBA), which have the capacity to store 500 million cubic meters.

But of the total reservoirs, 106 are not used. Without having a convincing explanation for why, the INRH has assigned resources to undertake the required maintenance.

In these dams out of service today, serious problems have accumulated over the years, leading to the paralyzing of the diverters, the master channels, and the irrigation systems so needed for the crops.

The unjustified waste of water accumulated in reservoirs , throughout the whole country, and its negative effect on agriculture, highlights the fact that the Cuban government has to allocate 1.8 billion dollars for food imports, most of which could  be produced in Cuba without any problem.

The underutilized reservoirs are located in the provinces of Pinar del Rio, Artemisa, Cienfuegos, Villa Clara, Camagüey, Holguín, Las Tunas and the special municipality of Isla de la Juventud. In these territories, the use of reservoir water is down 75%. And in another 35 of these reservoirs water use is down 25%. However, in the territories mentioned, accumulate 566 million cubic meters of water with virtually no destination. These provinces, until recently, were noted for their high agricultural production.

To the problem of under-utilization of the accumulated water in the reservoirs, we must add 778 million cubic meters of water that could be used for fish farming.

The other issue for which INRH has no solution in the offing, is the leaks in the hundreds of miles of major canals and their connection and distribution networks. Due to the deterioration of age and lack of maintenance, millions of cubic meters of the precious liquid are lost every day.

Cuba has no major rivers. Their courses, generally from north to south, are short. The rainfall has become more erratic due to the greenhouse effect. Therefore, the filling of reservoirs and groundwater in recent years has not been as reliable as in the past.

The water problem in Cuba is potentially critical. According to the index of the potential availability of water per capita, the country ranks 105th out of 182 countries, with a range of consumption of 3,404 cubic meters of water per capita.

At present, the government talks a lot about the need to achieve food security as collateral for the material welfare of the population, but it is pure slogan and talk, without concrete results.

From Cubanet

6 September 2013

We Are Fewer But With More Problems / Jorge Olivera Castillo

HAVANA, Cuba , September, www.cubanet.org – Raul Castro and those accompanying him in the exercise of power don’t give a damn about the unstoppable population decrease in Cuba. Faced with this unfortunate prediction, revealed by National Bureau of Statistics and Information (ONEI), we confirm once again that the government has no sense of the nation which, without a hint of modesty, it continues to call revolutionary.

The reluctance of the women to bring children into the world, clear from the high rate of abortions, has its foundation in the socio-economic problems. In addition to the depressed wages we have rising unemployment and the inability to choose a house or apartment with the minimum standards of livability. Currently, the deficit amounts to more than a million homes.

The current environment favors  alienation and marginalization, especially among young people, who tend to see their future away from the land of their birth. The preference for emigrating abroad is also another cause underlying the predictions of a marked decline in the population.

According to the government agency that brought to light details of the issues, By 2030 Cuba will have 10,904,985 inhabitants. Comparing this number to the current population, the decrease exceeds a quarter million people since the most recent census conducted last year, which counted 11,163,934 Cubans.

The consequences of such a reduction in a depopulated country, given that Cuba has a land area of 42,400 square miles, will be unpredictable. Extreme poverty , increase in prostitution and trafficking of drugs, decay of social services, among other high-impact phenomena in the lives of the majority of the people. Of course the heaviest part of the burden will fall on the shoulders of Cuba’s elderly. Many will not be able to endure the stifling conditions.

The symptoms of Social Darwinism are accelerated to the extent that the foundations of real socialism are dismantled. The extreme nationalization, characterized by arbitrary prohibitions, voluntarism and enlarging the bureaucracy to a scale never before seen, have been the main triggers for a series of anomalies that have ruined the economy and social fabric.

The worst news is the fact that there are no reasonable methods to reverse the situation. The circle of power is still committed to delaying a transition to facilitate the rearrangements necessary so that the country will not to fall into chaos. The economic changes implemented lack vision that is viable and pragmatic rather than obstructionist.

While the end for Raul Castro and his entourage is their conservation as a political class, nothing can be expected beyond the news compels them to take refuge in the most remote areas of pessimism.

In 2030 we will be fewer people with many more dilemmas to solve. The culprits of the disaster set back the clock of history at their convenience. So far, unfortunately, they have been lucky in their maneuvers.

Jorge Olivera Castillo – oliverajorge75@yahoo.com

From Cubanet

9 September 2013

Quote Unquote / Regina Coyula

I have the impression (subjective in the end and even mistaken) that the only “Battle of Ideas” has its place in virtual sites and in mass broadcasting media.  On the street, people can’t be more aligned.   Any group starts talking about soccer, or the start of school, and they end up talking about “the thing;” and if they talk about money or food, the temperature rises a few degrees more.  There are some — in general the private workers and those who protect their employee “benefits” with the State — who tend to be more discreet, but end up like “those people” or “that gentleman,” which are understood by any Cuban to be the polite version but full of disdain towards our leaders.

Saturday on the P-3 bus detained at the stop at the zoo, a young person behind me signaled to his companion with certainty to the building ahead and said, “Aldo the Aldeano lives there.  Talking about the hip hop of Los Aldeanos was like a sign to start a somewhat disjointed, but absolutely critical, conversation of the situation of the country. Soon the whole back of the bus exchanged frustrations and found catharsis, and not a single passenger, not one, articulated a timid defense of the government in general or the reforms in particular.  I got off in La Vibora leaving that spontaneous tribune in full swing.

I don’t know if there remains an appointed branch of the Ideological Department of the Central Committee of the Party; Opinion of the People, which as it name clarifies, compiles the popular sentiment with diverse intentions.  But if the trimmings of the Raulist updating happen to close the aforementioned branch, our president, or his son, or his grandson, should imitate this modern version of Harun Al-Rashid, of whom it is said that she went out to traverse his capital on a motorcycle camouflaged in her helmet.  Maybe in this way those in leadership could find out first hand and without adornment how “the thing” goes, since they won’t dare to ride a bus.

9 September 2013

Who Are You, Little Virgin? / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo

Poor little doll made of tinsel and wood, so battered across the long and narrow stretch of thousands and thousands of kilometers.

Last night, I saw her in Lawton, and it was daunting.

Because of her, and because of the bleak surroundings.  A neighborhood polluted from the disposition of its inhabitants to the sky that hangs above, propped up by the electric poles that shine a poor pasty yellow light. Houses like caves. Light and faces like grimaces. Light and the feeling that none of these collective biographies should be called human, let alone “from God” (amorphous animalia, ignorant by way of amnesia).

Light that only shines from the “Made in China”[1] patrol cars and in the sequins of the motorized traffic brigade.  The light that has an edge, but no faith in the insolent and proactive eyes of State.

At around 7:00 p.m., in winter time midnight begins in Cuba. It seemed like people were willing to shout anyone down, entertainment hysteria to welcome the weekend in style, as if it were a reggaeton concert (the style of clothing of the young people present proved it).

The motorcade barely slowed down under the traffic light although the corner of 16th and Dolores was a sea of bodies. I heard women curse the mothers of the drivers. I saw people hit the hood of the cars (in a remake of the movie Midnight Cowboy). The smell of conflict in the air did not abate, but added a patriotic spiciness to our pedestrian concept of devotion.

We remember the Virgin when she arrives, that is once during each Revolution.

And indeed, in her glass or acrylic shrine, carrying the pillar of our national coat of arms, and between the Vatican flag and our nation’s heroic rag (without Byrne-style[2] romanticisms in the 21st century: our flag represents barbarity, and I do not love it even if they force me to, mostly because it is the source of demagoguery uniting dictators and democrats).

The anonymous insular Mary finally descended on her rented automobile from the chapel kept by the nuns of Concepción Street, far beyond the Lawton bus depot, the now useless railroad lines and the already putrid River Pastrana; in that stretch of sub-industrial forest that invades the capital from the Cordón de La Habana[3].

Mambí Virgin[4].  The crowd running, cars honking, chants, clapping, prayers from the loudspeakers, a rope to keep the faithful in line. Human circles trained in the parishes, aging and semi-alienated men with their particular quasi-military but Christian-inspired speak plus 1970s fashions that include a dress belt up to their belly buttons. How uncool is Cuba!

Raw collage: Help out the Cuban faithful! It is a masquerade in which Cardinal Ortega comes out from under his own sleeves, and walks up B street to Porvenir Avenue, turns right on 10th Street, then speaks. continue reading

Our prelate looks exhausted behind the microphone. The Cardinal knows that Cuba does not love him any longer, first for being a coward and also an accomplice (among other closet secrets handled only by the Office of Religious Affairs of the Central Committee of a godless party).  No one pays attention to Jaime, “no thistle and no caterpillar”[5] he plants.  A drunkard kisses his hand, and the boys of State Security send the sudden devotee flying back to his non-place on the sidewalk.

And it makes sense that the words of an elderly man do not engage (nor fool) Cuba on this night: the superstar tonight is Cachita[6]. Besides, Ortega, since he first appeared on Cuban television without promotion or credits, keeps talking about Antonio de la Caridad Maceo y Grajales, a 19th century Cuban general who, before going out to kill his fellow men (or be killed by them), checked to make sure that he had, in his breast of starched mulatto, a little medal of the Virgin made of noble metal.

Then, the head of the Catholic Church in Cuba stops speaking, and finally is our turn alone with the headless incivility of the island.  And, we shower ourselves in vandalism: against the temple’s iron gates and up the steps, a movie scene not silent but screeching. Hundreds, thousands. Girls, old men. A man whose mother assured me that he had had a heart attack very recently. A lady whom I lifted from the sea of legs that would have crushed her (she was bleeding from her calves). And again expletives, holy debauchery.

The clerics and seminarians screaming with diction too correct to be violent, almost excommunicating their fellow congregants with primary school teacher admonitions like “if you don’t behave, there will be no virgin for anyone in this neighborhood.” We witness an avalanche of soccer finale proportions, or, of course, a concert in CUCs[7] for thugs who understand nothing.

This is our undeniable raw material (you cannot perpetually impose a myth from the minority, be it the Gospels or History Will Absolve Me[8]).  But, this stage set is missing the elite police brigade: the Special Forces units that perpetrate peace in a Special Period[9].

It is obvious that the Cuban state is interested in making the Catholic Church aware that so many processions a year will create a tragedy for them (I saw several women, all of them black, semi-unconscious being carried to different destinations). Let them buffet each other for a bit amid polyphony of laments and curses. But, it is obvious that some other worse curse words cannot be heard here:  “Liberty,” for example.

Right at that moment, some guys chide me because all of my pictures are focused on the people’s fisticuffs. We then argue over the possession of the truth.  I show them my white t-shirt that says “Laura Pollán Lives”[10].  They swirl around me and surround me while a woman loudly asks me from a distance for whom I work (they all have the language of the counter-intelligence TV series “Las Razones de Cuba”[11] and that of the official blogosphere), but I am already inside the temple, and I seek refuge by the main altar to capture the faces blessed by an Italian priests whose smile I cannot call divine, but democratic.

No wonder I have a work credential to shutterclick away without having my camera stolen or shredded “by mistake” or “by chance.”  And the Virgin that mother of all Cubans who precedes even the motherland, what is the Virgin doing here in her own procession?

Each prayer and each tear is accompanied by a picture taken with a cell phone. Our Lady of Charity is therefore a little bit of pop icon amidst so much media fruition (Nokiarity Syndrome). Her disposition seems a bit timid despite her olive skin, so clean and congenial, Cecilially she is a Valdés[12].  And, with a certain wooden modesty, it could be said that our virgin hides in Islamic fashion under her cloak of sorceress queen. Perhaps, it will be difficult for her to discern whether she is worshiped by subjects of God or Nothingness.  Perhaps She knows more than a few things about tomorrow (with that sad grimace of hers). Perhaps she feels very lonely, condemned to carry that baby who does not grow for eternity.

Poor little Cuban virgin, so fragile, surrounded by a flower holocaust, petals with that smell so peremptorily funerary.

Poor little virgin surrounded by the medieval Cuban populace, forced to the insomnia of the donated electric fans, walled behind that music so falsely happy for when death comes to us, egged on like a fugitive by the brown-out looming over the convent confiscated and turned into a school (this is precisely how the totalitarian state imposes its narrative: turning on and off the central switch).

Poor, oh poor, our Cachita, so invisible under the greedy gaze of the mob, willing to be Maceos in exchange for a quality miracle.

Poor, oh poor, my darling, so Cuban and yet no one in Cuba knows it because they are content with lighting some candles to you and asking you for a visa to the United States. No one spoke of love, my darling. No one in this island or in the Exile ever knew who you were. Now, for example, they will charge against me, but you and I secretly know very well that you and I recognized each other at least this once.

Little Virgin without name or history.  Little ephemeral Virgin of my soul that fades already. Little Virgin of Truth.

[1] In English in the original text.

[2] Refers to Bonifacio Byrne, a Cuban poet who wrote a famous poem to the Cuban national flag from the ship that brought him back to the island in 1899.

[3] El Cordón de La Habana (Havana Cordon) was a plan created by Fidel Castro to plant Caturra coffee beans (a Cuban native variety) around the Cuban capital in 1971-73.  Predictably, the plan failed because of soil incompatibility and administrative blunders.  It did manage, however, to successfully eliminate most of the little individual vegetable gardens in the area.

[4] Mambí were the Cuban rebels who opposed and rose against Spanish rule in the 19th century.  Many were devotees of the virgin, and carried her image into battle.  Virgen Mambisa is also the title of a 20th century hymn to the Our Lady that can be heard here:  http://youtu.be/cq9kGJ44ecw

[5] This is a play on words from Ortega and a verse in José Martí’s poem “Cultivo Una Rosa Blanca” that is in turn part of “Versos Sencillos,” a compilation of poems. The verse reads “cardo ni oruga cultivo/cultivo una rosa blanca”: “neither thistle nor worm I grow/I grow a white rose” roughly.

[6] Cachita or Cacha is a nickname given to women named Caridad (Charity) in Cuba.  The ever cheeky Cubans have given it to Our Lady of Charity as well.

[7] CUC is Cuba’s “convertible” peso, one of the two currencies in use in the island.  It is artificially paired to the U.S. dollar.

[8] History Will Absolve Me was Fidel Castro’s defense speech at his trial for the assault of the Moncada Army Barracks in 1953 in Santiago de Cuba. It was later made into a book, a sort of tropical Mein Kempf (from which it borrowed heavily, including the phrase used as its title).

[9] The Special Period (Período Especial) was the name given by the regime to the period of extreme economic straits following the collapse of the Soviet Union (Cuba’s main political and economic ally and subsidizer) in 1991.  Its end is not very well defined, but seems to have been around the time when the late Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez started to send oil and money to the island.

[10] Laura Pollán was the leader and founder of the Ladies in White, a group of Cuban women whose husbands and/or relatives were imprisoned during the purge known as the Black Spring of 2003.  They have marched, and still march peacefully every Sunday after Mass carrying gladioli and dressed in white asking, initially, for the release of their loved ones, and, now, that the regime respects the human rights of all Cubans.  They have been subjected to extreme abuse by the regime and its goons.  Laura Pollán died under mysterious circumstances in 2011.

[11] “Las Razones de Cuba” was multi-part a documentary produced by the counter-intelligence services of the Ministry of Interior in Cuba that supposedly unmasked covert operations of “enemies of the people” and revealed how the government has infiltrated the opposition movements.

[12] Another play on words: it refers to Cecilia Valdés the main character in the 19th century novel of the same name written by Cirilo Villaverde.

Translated by: Ernesto Ariel Suarez

8 September 2013

Cuba Wants No More Private Stores / Ivan Garcia

29-moda-3-389x330Going shopping or simply browsing through Havana’s large stores is a popular hobby for many of the capital’s residents. But few of them can afford to buy anything without first looking at the scandalous prices of the merchandise, which is levied with taxes ranging from 240% to 300%.

Most buy just the essentials: a liter of cooking oil, two bars of bath soap, a box of tomato puree or a 250 gram bag of detergent. Others visit the stores to look at the display window mannequins dressed in brand-name clothes or the widescreen TVs they can never afford.

Since 2006, when General Raúl Castro took up the presidential baton after being hand-picked by his brother Fidel, the military regime has eliminated ridiculous regulations and autocratic prohibitions which had reduced average Cubans to the status of fourth-class citizens in their own country.

Property rights in Cuba were merely a semantic nicety. Legally, people could not sell houses, works of art or cars obtained after 1959 (though they were sold anyway on the very efficient black market). In 2011 Castro II legalized what for a long had been taking place under the table.

After the unexpected fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of Soviet Communism, blank checks, canned fruit and petroleum from the Caucuses stopped arriving in Cuba.

Fidel Castro encouraged a do-or-die resistance. When he proposed at a women’s conference in 1991 that the attendees hold onto their clothes because they would be in short supply for the foreseeable future, some thought he was joking.

The man was not kidding. The ration book for manufactured goods vanished, leaving only the one for food. The island reverted to a state of destitution, devastated by hunger, exotic illnesses and run-away inflation.

After dollars were allowed to circulate legally in 1993, the gaps and differences in a society designed to make everyone on the low-end equal became apparent.

Those who had dollars lived better than state workers, who earned poverty-level wages. Getting dressed meant spending the equivalent of six-months’ salary. continue reading

In a nation where advertising barely existed and the state’s hard-currency monopoly was fierce, shirts, blouses, pants, shoes and other goods had to be purchased in a chain of stores operated by military businessmen.

And the prices! Clothes of the poorest quality bought in bulk from China, from small-scale suppliers in the Panama Canal zone or from Brazilian wholesale markets were sold in Cuban stores. Jeans with a counterfeit label, mediocre quality footwear and a Brazilian shirt could well cost a hundred dollars. Few could afford it.

Getting dressed in Cuba is an odyssey. Rather than money, those who have relatives overseas prefer they send clothing and footwear. Cubans who work with foreigners routinely ask that they leave behind their clothes when they return home.

Since late 1980s, at least in Havana, there have been people who make their living selling clothing, footwear and costume jewelry surreptitiously. They would acquire large amounts of dollars when it was still illegal and, through contacts with young foreigners studying in Cuba or tourists on vacation, would make large purchases of cheap merchandise in stores reserved for diplomats and foreign technical workers. They would later resell the items on the underground market.

Formal wear has always been a profitable business in Cuba. With the legalization of the dollar and the opening of thousands of state-run stores selling it for hard currency, vendors had to make business adjustments.

They began offering it at prices lower than at state-run stores. In 2010 dressmakers and tailors were authorized to sell their wares legally. Thousands of casas-shoppings (home markets) or trapi-shoppings (“rag” markets) opened throughout the country.

The items for sale came from the other side of the Florida Straits, from Cubans working in Bolivia, Ecuador and Venezuela, or from illegal transactions by employees working in the big consumer goods stores.

Right alongside the Carlos III shopping mall in Central Havana is a thriving private market. Alica, a professor, often frequents these types of private stores.

“The prices are much lower than in the official stores,” she says, “which are not only very expensive but also sell a lot of very unfashionable junk.

Last weekend the authorities gave the new private stores a deadline. The regime’s ultimatum was highlighted in a newspaper article from Sancti Spiritus province.

“The deadline is intended to restore of the function of self-employed dressmakers and tailors to the function originally intended. By September 1 there should be not a single casa-shopping operating in either Sancti Spiritus or in Cuba,” reports Escambray, a Villa Clara newspaper.

Diario de Las Américas interviewed an inspector from the national tax office who said, “It has been shown that a significant amount of merchandise in these private stores enters Cuba surreptitiously, including some things that are known to have been stolen.”

This tightening of the screws on private stores is nothing new. In 2012 the Customs Service of the Republic restricted inexpensive merchandise entering the island. In the aftermath of this offensive, owners of private stores said that the government had used a slew of restrictions in order to raise sales in their own stores, which had suffered a decline of almost 30%.

“It’s a treacherous form of competition. They use repressive laws to try to recapture their lost clientele,” says one disgruntled private vendor.

The owner of a store in the Tenth of October neighborhood believes that, “even if they prohibit them, one way or another people will still buy clothing under the table because of the poor quality and high prices at the state stores.”

“We only have to change the way we operate. If we can no longer sell things legally in the entryways of our houses,” she says, “we will just go back to doing things the way we did in the 1980s.”

We Cubans are used to the black market. It is our normal way of operating.

Iván García

Photo from Redada contra las trapishoppings

8 September 2013

Eliecer Avila Defends His Right To Be Politically Active / Lilianne Ruiz

Moderator Gustavo Pérez (left), Eliecer Ávila (center). Photo by Lilianne Ruiz.

HAVANA, Cuba, September 6, 2013, Lilianne Ruiz / www.cubanet.org. – Recently, the Patmos Forum held its third conference. This time the topic of discussion was The Quality of Life, in connection with politics.

The meeting was attended by about 30 people, gathered in the courtyard at the home of independent journalist Yoel Espinosa Medrano, located in the center of a Santa Clara favela (squatter settlement), a few meters from the most important political plaza of the province.

The moderator was Gustavo Pérez Silverio, the historian and researcher on racial matters, who maintains a working connection with the regime.

The special guest was Eliezer Ávila, who is slowly ceasing to be identified only as the young University of Information Science student who got into trouble with the former President of the National Assembly, and is becoming known as a political leader who could have some role in the future of the island.

Ávila began his talk by defining himself as “a Cuban citizen who wants to exercise his right to engage in politics in Cuba.”

The lack of civic culture was addressed as the key to the whole question, recognizing that in the lack of civic responsibility lies the problem of freedom for Cubans. “A citizen is a person who has power, not someone who has to sacrifice themselves for a project in which they are not involved in the decision-making process, “said Avila.

After his speech of over an hour, the floor was opened to audience questions. Librado Linares, the former political prisoner from the Cause of 75 (from the Black Spring of 2003), began by recognizing the invited guest as a man with political talent, motivation, and strength. But he said he was unable to discern in Avila’s “We Are More” movement a concrete strategy for enlisting citizens, overcome by terror and apathy, or for dealing with the pattern of repression by the political police against the Movement.

The We Are More Political Movement would bring together people of different political persuasions, united by the common interest of presenting concrete demands to the Castro government. It would not be limited to Cubans living on the island, but would also welcome Cubans from the diaspora.

“This is a project that I want to build with the views of as many people as possible, because I do not want the people to serve one point of view, but for the point of view to serve the people,” he said.

The bloggers from La Joven Cuba (Young Cuba), labeled by the regime as the “loyal opposition,” had been invited to the Patmos meeting.

Regarding the absence of La Joven Cuba bloggers, Ávila told Cubanet:

“I don’t believe that any political distance is healthy. I had hoped this dialogue would occur, but at the last minute I was told that they had no interest in participating and invited me to dialogue on their blog. It is ridiculous for one Cuban to invite another to a discussion on the Internet, knowing that we don’t have that possibility.”

The Patmos Forum, created in February 2013 by a group of activists led by Baptist pastor Mario Félix Lleonart, was conceived as a space for the discussion of various topics in which different schools of thought are represented.

Previous events were devoted to the Origin of Life and the Right to Life, consecutively.

On this occasion, Lleonart announced the adoption and adaptation by “Patmos” of the Manual of Political Advocacy of the organization Christian Solidarity Worldwide, with the intention of providing workshops that equip Cuban believers with the power to influence the country’s politics, and end the myth that Christians are alienated from partisan politics that affect their quality of life and respect for human rights.

By Lilianne Ruiz, From Cubanet

Translated by Tomás A.

6 September 2013

Actress Ana Luisa Rubio, Savagely Beaten by Alleged Neighbors

Photo by Ailer Gonzalez
Photo by Ailer Gonzalez

“Violence has reached critical levels in Cuba,” says activist Antonio Rodiles, and actress Ana Luisa Rubio, 62, just experienced it. The photo above is her face after a severe beating given to her by a group of supposed neighbors last Friday.

“I am very sore, but mostly I’m very scared,” Rubio told Diario de Cuba from her home in the Havana neighborhood of Vedado. “They will not stop.”

Rubio spent a night in Manuel Fajardo Hospital because of the beating.  Rodiles, director of the independent State of Sats project, accompanied her to the police the following day to file a complaint, the twelfth by the actress. The previous were for assault, threats, defamation, home invasion, property damage and coercion.

“The police do not do anything,” said Rubio. The result is that the attackers “feel impunity before the law.”

The actress said that on the day of the incident she went outside after a group of children knocked insistently on her door in what was supposedly part of a game.

“I went to demand some peace,” she said. “That was all, and right there a woman lunged at me, someone I have already reported on other occasions for insults and threats, but nothing ever happened… I didn’t have time to defend myself or to seek shelter, because it was one thing after another; instantly I started feeling the kicks, punches,  and blows from many people.”

She only recognized three of the participants in the beating: two neighbors and the area coordinator of the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR). The rest were unknown.

In total, there were ten men and women who left her lying on the floor, alone, after the attack, according to her version.

“She called us very nervous, saying she was bloodied and needed help,” Ailer Gonzalez, artistic director of State of Sats, told DiariodeCuba.com, and along with Rodiles and activist Juan Antonio Madrazo, she accompanied Rubio to the hospital.

“They have given her a tremendous beating … they beat her badly,” she said.

Opposite the house of Rubio is a Communist Party office and in the same block an office of the CDR.

Madrazo said that when they got to the home of the actress, on Friday, responding to her request for help, they heard the coordinator of the CDR, surnamed Duran, say to a person he was talking to on the phone, “She was given a good beating, but if she comes down again, we will fuck her up.”

Police were at Rubio’s home on Saturday and she pointed to the two women and Duran among her assailants. None was arrested, Madrazo confirmed.

From television to the dungeons

Ana Luisa "then and now"
Ana Luisa “then and now”

Ana Luisa Rubio was a popular television actress on the island until the last decade when she began to engage in internal dissent.

In recent years she has been arrested several times, most recently on August 24, when she stood in the Plaza of the Revolution “to shout for justice, for freedom, for human rights,” as she said.

After the arrests, “They always take me to the psych ward” of a hospital in Havana. “The doctors have already told them not to take me there any more, that there is nothing wrong with me,” said the actress.

“They are trying to show that I’m crazy so that there is no validity to what I say,” she said. “For me this is not even just a dictatorship, this is fascism.”

Rubio has also belonged to the Ladies in White and writes the blog Aramusa28, from which she denounced the aggressions she has suffered and called for the resignation of Raul Castro.

In her view, the beating on Friday, “was arranged by State Security.”

The harassment and attacks started “long ago already, I would say years, but they have escalated,” she said. She added that in 2004 she spent nine months in a wheelchair due to an attack.

“I can’t do anything; I don’t know where to turn. My comrades do their best, but we ‘re totally defenseless” complained the actress.

The Government no longer allows her to work in state television.

“They don’t even let me breathe, I have no income at all … they censored me as an actress in 2011 for being in the Ladies in White,” she said.

Currently, Rubio rents a room in her home as a form of self-employment. But “they don’t even let, my guests are intercepted,” she said. “They’re suffocating me in a way in which have no way to eat, or breath, or even laugh.

From DiariodeCuba.com

9 September 2013

Creole Block / Yoani Sanchez

Beto was one of those who handed out beatings in August of 1994. With his helmet, his mortar-splattered pants and an iron bar in his hand, he lashed out at some of the protestors during the Maleconazo. At that time he was working on a construction team and felt like part of an elite. He had milk at breakfast, a room he shared with other colleagues, and a salary higher than any doctor’s. He spent the years of his youth building hotels, but a decade ago, when his brigade was demobilized, he became unemployed. He didn’t want to return to the village of Banes where he was born, not him, nor many others of that troop ready to build a wall or break heads.

Several of these construction workers were allowed to settle in a makeshift neighborhood in the Havana suburbs. The received the benefit of permission to build a “llega y pon*” — a shantytown — near Calle 100 and Avenida Rancho Boyeros. A crumb, after so much ideological loyalty. Without the perks and high wages, many of these bricklayers had to survive on what they could find. Beto set up a workshop for fabricating “creole bricks.” Other neighbors in his makeshift neighborhood also dedicate themselves to building materials: sand, stone powder… bricks. With the new relaxations giving permission for the repair and building by one’s own efforts, the business of “aggregates” prospers, involving more people every day. The producers, transporters, brigade leaders, and finally the men who load the sacks on the trucks. A chain of work — parallel to the State’s — more efficient, but also at higher prices.

Beto doesn’t like talking about the past. In his shirt full of holes he walks between the stacks of Creole blocks coming out of his little factory. When he sees one that has cracked or that has a broken corner, he shouts at one of his employees who mixes the mortar for casting the molds. He carries an iron rod in his hand, as he did on 5 August 1994, but this time it’s for knocking against the blocks, checking the strength of his product. He frequently glances over to the little house he is building at the end of this unpaved street with no drains. For the first time he has something of his own, something no one has given him. He is a man with neither privilege nor obedience.

*Translator’s note: “llega y pon” is literally “arrive and put.”