Marxism Professor is Cuba’s Social Networks Czar / Juan Juan Almeida

Juan Juan Almeida, 19 October 2017 — A Marxism professor who is also an official of the Ideological Department of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) is responsible for implementing the Cuban government’s strategy for the use of social networks from the island.

Joaquín Suárez González , 52, a graduate of Marxism, Leninism and History at the  “Félix Varela” Pedagogical Institute in Santa Clara, and an official of the Ideological Department of the Central Committee of the PCC, is in charge of organizing the propaganda maneuvers through the social networks, and distributing among an army of netizens the tasks approved and supervised by the Council of State, the Council of Ministers, the National Defense Council, and the National Defense and Security Commission, Martí News has learned.

Engineers, programmers, designers, specialists in Support and Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), make up this small elite group led by Suárez González, who, upon the conclusion of the elections and the installation of the National Constituent Assembly (ANC) in Venezuela, won the recognition of President Nicolás Maduro for working actively and without rest for more than 24 hours in the rapid dissemination of the campaign and the hashtags for use in different platforms.

Social networks are the most active and dynamic phenomenon in the world today, so the tactic that the Cuban government manages is not to impose the benefits of the communist system and its doctrine, but to reach as many users as possible, and try fascinate them by showing the most attractive and unique side of the so-called “revolution.”

To carry the message of the Cuban government through social networks, all the state administration agencies, ministries and the press are subordinated to this commando of technologists and ideologues.

The Cuban Institute of Friendship with the Peoples (ICAP), Intelligence and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MINREX), are responsible for transmitting “when and how to act” to the different embassies, consulates, collaborators, and “Friends of Cuba” so that all of them, in unison, can activate profiles on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and support each entrusted mission, whether it be to ask for help for the destruction caused by a hurricane, to enhance the firmness of a people that provide solidarity to a needy nation, to discredit dissidents and/or influence, with the help of cyberspace, the opinion of thousands of young people everywhere in the world.

The most recent action took place during the “Networks Operation for the 149th anniversary of the Beginning of the War of Independence,” on October 10, when the remains of the hero Carlos Manuel de Céspedes and the outstanding patriot Mariana Grajales were buried in the Santa Ifigenia cemetery of Santiago de Cuba (where they joined the remains of José Martí and Fidel Castro).

According to Joaquín, on that occasion, the hashtags #VivaCubaLibre, #Cuba, #10deOctubre, #CubaEsNuestra and #SantiagodeCuba were the most significant.

Currently the cybernetic troop is training on the networks to launch incentive politics with the purpose of collecting opinions to design strategies and hashtags, and to “viralize” the last stage of the nomination process of candidates with a view to the elections for Cuba’s presidential turnover in 2018.