14ymedio

The "Yes" Campaign Invades Cuba’s High Schools and Universities

The Government is seeking to attract Yes votes among the youngest voters for the February 24 referendum. Shown here: Young people in front of the famous steps of the University of Havana.

14ymedio, Marcelo Hernández, Havana, January 11, 2019 — Meetings, morning assemblies, and talks in high school courses and university faculties all over the country are some of the strategies that the Cuban Government has put into practice to promote the Yes vote among the youngest voters, especially those who, in the February 24 referendum on the new Constitution, will cast a vote at the polls for the first time.

Since classes resumed in January, after the end of year break, the official Yes campaign for the new Constitution has landed in upper secondary and university classrooms via conferences, discussion groups, and classes. Professors call for the ratification of the Constitution in order to “maintain the achievements of the Revolution” and “keep the country from falling into the enemy’s hands,” according to students’ testimonies gathered by 14ymedio. continue reading

The promotion of the Yes vote extends to activities organized by the Secondary School Students’ Federation (FEEM) and the University Students’ Federation (FEU).

Additionally, the subject has come up at school morning assemblies in all State institutions, where harangues and calls to “support the Revolution” with a Yes vote are abundant.

“They informed us of the new content of the Defense Preparation course last Monday at the morning assembly,” a 12th grade student in a high school program in Old Havana tells this newspaper. “We already had the first class and the whole time they talked to us of the importance of voting Yes because that was the only way to protect the homeland from its enemies and to be able to keep healthcare and education free,” he adds.

The teenager, who turned 16 in November, assures that the professor teaching the material asserted that “a No is counterrevolutionary” and those who “vote No want to destroy the country and all the achievements of the Revolution.” The class segment on this subject lasted 45 minutes and “the whole time was about the importance of attending the referendum and not letting oneself be influenced by those who are calling for a No vote.”

Other testimonies gathered in Santiago de Cuba, Villa Clara, and Sancti Spíritus confirm that it is a strategy at the national level of which the Ministries of Education and of Higher Education refused to give details to questions from this newspaper.

In Santa Clara, Jean Carlo, 16, has already heard two talks on the subject in his high school program. “At the first one a man dressed as a soldier came and joined the professor and said that from the United States they were financing counterrevolutionaries to promote the campaign for No,” he remembers.

“The other time it was taught by the history teacher and she explained to us that we are in a very important moment for the Revolution, and if it was the responsibility of some to attack the Moncada Barracks and of others to fight in Girón (the Bay of Pigs), it’s our responsibility to fight so that Yes wins in the referendum.”

In universities all over the Island, which in the 2018-2019 school year have some 240,000 students, the official Yes campaign has also begun in classrooms, even though until the last days of January, students in higher education take their final exams of the semester and only come to the institutions to do reviews or take exams.

“Every day they say something, in some review (for exams) or in some appeal from the FEU,” says Brandon, 21, who is enrolled in one of the faculties of the iconic University Hill in the nation’s flagship university in Havana. “The students listen but almost nobody asks or says anything, they only hear,” he emphasizes.

The situation recalls the so-called Battle of Ideas, an ideological turn of the screw that Fidel Castro pushed at the beginning of this century. The intense campaign included weekly public actions, known as Open Forums, the creation of a red guard of very aggressive young people, known as “social workers,” and more political activities in schools.

However, with Raúl Castro’s arrival to power many of those programs broke up for lack of resources. “It’s not that ideology has been relaxed in schools, much less in universities, but that there weren’t funds to sustain all that propagandistic machinery,” believes Katty, a recent graduate in pedagogy.

In the last week the Cuban Government has intensified its Yes campaign on national media and has placed advertisements for Yes at baseball games and in the news on national television. However, promoters of No or of abstention do not appear in any of these settings.

Translated by: Sheilagh Carey

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The Authorities Blame the Driver for the Viazul Bus Crash

Luis Ladrón de Guevara, director of transport of passengers for the Ministry of Transport in Cuba, gave a press conference in Havana. (EFE / Ernesto Mastrascusa)

EFE / 14ymedio, Havana, 11 January 2018 – The Government of Cuba signaled this Friday that the 55-year old driver was directly responsible for a tragic bus crash; he was accused of having lost control of the vehicle for not taking appropriate safety measures resulting in a toll of seven dead and dozens injured.

“Direct responsibility of the driver in this unfortunate event has been determined,” the Ministry of the Interior (Minint) wrote in a press release in state media, in which it offered news on the investigation of the crash that occurred Thursday afternoon in the province of Guantánamo, the fourth on Cuban roads that involved a passenger bus in less than a month. continue reading

The bus driver, who has 25 years of experience in the sector, allegedly failed to comply with the section of the Road and Traffic Code that requires slowing down or stopping if required by traffic, the state of the road or visibility, and driving with extreme caution in adverse conditions, according to the Minint.

The Viazul state company bus with 40 passengers on board overturned at approximately 4:00 p.m. after the driver lost control on a curve at kilometer 22 of the Guantanamo-Baracoa highway, where the pavement was wet and slippery, authorities of the Ministry of Transport (Mitrans) explained during a press conference.

The driver could face “criminal and administrative sanctions” if it is determined that he committed a crime, said the transport director of Mitrans, Luis Ladrón de Guevara.

In any case, he noted that it is still premature to draw conclusions and indicated that a commission has been created composed of officials from state/local agencies and Víazul to investigate the event in more detail.

Three Cubans, two Argentinian women, a German woman and a French man lost their lives in the accident, which also left 33 injured.

Of the injured, five are in serious condition: a Spanish woman, a French woman and three Cubans, while a three-year-old Spanish child suffered multiple injuries but remains stable.

The list of injured also includes another Spanish man, nine more Cubans, three Argentinian men, two Mexican men and twelve citizens from the United Kingdom, Canada, the US, the Netherlands, France and Germany.

The incident Thursday was the second massive crash reported in the eastern region of Cuba so far this week, after a crash between a bus and a passenger train left twelve injured on January 8.

In addition, on December 27, two people were killed and 33 injured in a traffic crash involving a truck with a trailer loaded with sugarcane and a passenger bus from the state company Astro. On December 12 another incident, again involving a passenger bus, left three dead and 29 injured in the vicinity of Mayarí, in the province of Holguín.

Traffic crashes are the fifth leading cause of mortality in Cuba, where last year one was recorded every 47 minutes, for an average of one death every 12 hours.

In 2018 the number of catastrophic crashes soared alarmingly in the country, which has recorded more than 4,400 deaths since 2012, according to official data.

The most recent report shows that between January and October of 2018 there were more than 8,000 traffic crashes on the island.

Most are attributed to a lack of attention by the driver, ignoring the right of way or speeding, but contributing factors are the poor conditions of the roads and the aging fleet of motor vehicles in the Caribbean country, with cars more than 50 years old on the road.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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A Fire at La Benefica Hospital Forces Evacuation of a Majority of Patients

Trained firefighters and hospital workers helped control the flames. (ACN)

14ymedio, Havana, 11 January 2019 — The Miguel Enríquez Clinical Surgical Teaching Hospital of Havana suffered a fire on Thursday night that forced the immediate evacuation of some patients. This Friday morning personnel were still working on the resumption of services and the cleaning of the damaged areas.

As reported by the official press, the incident began in the “ventilation shaft of the acute care area” of the hospital institution, located in the municipality of 10 de Octubre and more popularly known as La Benéfica. The incident affected the electricity and about 100 beds located between the second and seventh floors.

The trained forces of firefighters and hospital workers helped to control the flames so that they did not spread to other areas of the building to where most of the patients were evacuated. Those hospitalized with more serious conditions were transferred to nearby facilities, hospital director Jorge Daniel Poyo explained to the press.

No other details are known currently about what occurred but the cause of the fire is already under investigation as well as an assessment of the damage it caused.

Last year two other health facilities were also affected by fires, the Hospital Oncológico and the Pediatric Marfán, both located in Havana.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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Cuban Babalawos Predict a Bad Year for Agriculture

Babalawos gathered for the announcement of the Letter of the Year. (Facebook/Juan Blanco)

14ymedio, Havana, January 2, 2018 — Cuban babalawos [Yoruba spiritual title for a Santeria priest] have again predicted a year of difficulties, especially in the agricultural sector, but also for natural phenomenons, venereal diseases, and migratory conflicts, according to the Letter of the Year published by the Yoruba Cultural Association of the Island (ACYC).

The prediction, which since 2016 the ACYC has made jointly with the independent Commission of the Letter of the Year, was shared this Tuesday after a foretaste was announced at the end of the year, and afterwards the babalawos met for the opening ceremony of 2019 that was presided over by the priest of Ifá Ángel Custodio Padrón. continue reading

The Letter of the Year, the series of predictions that priests of the Yoruba religion make every January, is much anticipated by practitioners of Santeria and by the population in general. This year it explains that the orisha Oshún–syncretized in the Catholic religion with the patron saint of Cuba, the Virgin of Charity of El Cobre–will reign. The deity will be accompanied by Oggún, who represents blacksmiths, wars, technology, and surgeons.

In the recommendations included in the text, the babalawos call for respecting elders and seeking religious training; avoiding problems with the law; making better use of agricultural resources; and avoiding confrontations and quarrels.

The Letter predicts an increase of sexually transmitted diseases, along with malignant diseases of the colon, and rectum, among others.

In January of last year an intense controversy was sparked after the publication of the Letter of the Year of 2018, for its calls to “not conspire” and to respect authority, something that various babalawos branded as taking the side of the Government.

The Free Yorubas Association, an independent group made up of priests of this religion, classified that Letter as “totally manipulated and keeping with the interests of atheist materialist tyranny” and labeled the babalawos who wrote it as lacking “moral religious authority to speak in the name of Yorubas and publish predictions that affect the present and future” of the country.

Letter of the Year 2019

Ruling Sign: Oshe Ogunda

First Witness: Ika Ogunda

Second Witness: Osa Kuleya

Prophetic Prayer: Osorbu Iku Intori Ogu.

Orula Onire: Adimu (a yam cut into two halves and rubbed with red palm oil, along with a coconut split in two and two candles)

Otan Onishe Ara: Sarayeye with a chicken and it is given to Oggun, with the other ingredients and it is bathed with herbs of Paraldo.

Otan deity that rules: Oshun

Accompanying deity: Oggun Otan

Flag: Yellow with green borders

Ebbo: 1 kid (for Elegba), 5 small gourds, to which is added indigo, honey, palm oil, bone breaking stick, and blood of the goat, and it is hung on the door, and the other ingredients.

Other ingredents: (Later bathe with ewe still alive)

Governing divinity: OCHUN.

Accompanying deity: OGGUN.

Flag of the year: Yellow with green borders

Sayings of the Sign:

– It is not finished with the same knife.

– The arrow is not let fly without first going to the battlefield.

– What is left is not returned to and collected.

Illnesses which increase in rate:

-Illnesses of the stomach and intestines

-Increase of the rate of sexually transmitted diseases

-Impotence at a young age, as a consequence of prostate problems in men

-Malignant diseases of the colon and rectum.

Events of Social Interest:

-Problems will continue in the agricultural sector fundamentally in the production of food, produce, and vegetables as a consequence of the poor fertilization of the soil.

-Incursions of seawater that can produce floods and landslides. Increase of migratory conflicts.

-The danger and threats of natural catastrophes of all types will continue.

Recommendations:

-Sign that warns of the danger that wastefulness can cause.

-It is recommended to avoid the poor utilization of chemical products in agricultural production.

– Caution with epidemics and illnesses.

– Avoid confrontations and quarrels.

– It is recommended to maintain an adequate religious ethic.

– It’s necessary to seek cooperation and help one another to achieve the outlined objectives.

– Respect elders and seek religious training.

– Avoid problems with the law.

– Increase of venereal diseases as a product of sexual debauchery.

– Make better use of agricultural resources.

– An equilibrium is recommended in all spheres.

– It is recommended to strengthen oggun. (look to godparents for this).

– It’s necessary to be careful with excessive consent of parents with their children.

– Parents must pay careful attention to the care and education of children.

– Self medication is prohibited.

Translated by: Sheilagh Carey

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Massive Accident in Guantanamo Leaves Six Dead

A massive accident took place in the vicinity of kilometer 25 of the Guantanamo-Baracoa highway, in which six people died. (ACN)

14ymedio, Havana, 10 January 2019 – A massive accident occurred this Thursday afternoon near the hill of La Herradura in the vicinity of kilometer 25 of the Guantánamo-Baracoa highway, leaving six people dead and about thirty injured.

The accident occurred when a Chinese-make Yutong bus from the Vía Azul company, which traveled the route from Baracoa to Havana, overturned after the bus lost control when the driver executed a maneuver to overtake another vehicle, some of the witnesses explained to the official press. continue reading

Dr. Yoandris Reyes, deputy surgical director of the Agostino Neto hospital in the city of Guantanamo, said that the facility received 33 injured and said that most came with orthopedic trauma, blows or friction burns. He added that there are five patients with code red, at high risk for their lives and that three of them received surgical care and two remain in the Intensive Care Unit.

A multidisciplinary team was activated in the health facility after the accident and specialists of the Ministry of the Interior were investigating other details of the event at the incident site.

It is the fourth accident on Cuban roads that involves a passenger bus in less than a month.

On December 27, two people were killed and 33 injured in a traffic crash involving a truck with a trailer loaded with sugarcane and a passenger bus from the state company Astro. On December 12 another crash, also with a passenger bus, left three dead and 29 injured in the vicinity of Mayarí, in the province of Holguín.

Also this week a passenger bus of the state company Transtur collided with a train at a railway-level crossing on the Bayamo-Las Tunas highway, a crash that left 12 injured.

In 2017, 11,187 traffic crashes were recorded in the country, leaving 750 dead and 7,999 injured, according to reports from the National Road Safety Commission. Since 2012, according to the same source, more than 4,400 deaths have been reported on Cuban roads. Three days ago, Minister of Transport Adel Yzquierdo was removed from his post a position he held since 2015.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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A Constitution to Institutionalize the Dictatorship

More than three million copies of the constitutional text are for sale. The referendum will be held on February 24. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, January 10, 2019 — A close reading of the final version of the new Constitution of the Republic, which will be submitted to a referendum on February 24, allows the conclusion that none of the 760 changes made by the drafting commission does anything to alter the negative opinion that was held of the draft.

Perhaps the best example was the change suffered by Article 5 and not just because of the return of the concept of communism that generated so much discussion, but the mocking introduction of the conjunction “and” to substitute the hyphen in the word “Marxist-Leninist.” According to the explanation, “in the opinion of various academics it was a formulation with a Stalinist tinge.” continue reading

In second place is the balancing act performed to make the controversial Article 68 disappear and in its place introduce similar precepts in Article 82. The celebration that the most conservative anticipated for the supposed victory was frustrated upon realizing that the door that would open the path to marriage equality had only changed places.

However, for the LGBT community the new article also has a bittersweet flavor since it sets a period of up to two years to define who can get married. This postponement evidently seeks to prevent a negative vote in the referendum from those opposed to these unions.

Another change that has passed unnoticed is that regarding legal rights (Article 49), which previously indicated that “no person can be obligated to testify against himself, his spouse, or relatives up to the fourth degree of consanguinity and second of affinity,” while now (Article 95) “common-law partner” is included.

In Article 95 itself the order is expressed that in a penal process, persons can have access to “legal assistance from the beginning of the process.” This has perhaps been one of the most-exhibited aspects as a demonstration of the respect toward rights in the future, but it shows the lack of due-process guarantees from which numerous citizens have suffered since that precept was eliminated.

It would be worthwhile to do a study of the ups and downs that the concept of “concentration of ownership” has been subjected to. Since its appearance in the guidelines of the VI Congress, passing through what was added in the VII Congress’s version and later in the Conceptualization of the Model project, the topic arrived at the final version of the Constitution rather decaffeinated.

Article 22 of the draft said: “The State regulates that no concentration of ownership exists in legal persons or non-state entities, in order to preserve the limits compatible with the socialist values of equity and social justice.”

In the new version Article 30 says this: “The concentration of ownership in legal persons or non-state entities is regulated by the State, which additionally guarantees a more and more just redistribution of wealth in order to preserve the limits…”

Having maintained the concept of the irrevocability of the socialist system and the position of the only Party as the ruling political force justifies the assessment that the main thing that should have changed has not changed.

With the validity of those two pillars any attempt to compare the draft submitted to debate with the final version approved by Parliament is a true waste of time, even when one has the noble intent of itemizing the details that can be considered positive to contrast them with the negative. In addition to a sterile exercise it can be considered a pernicious habit.

The truly useful thing seems to be using space, energy, and talent to find a way to prevent the definitive insitutionalization of the dictatorship. There remains little time and it’s necessary to hurry up and settle on a consensus so that Cubans don’t suffer the same fate as the unsuspecting rabbits from the fable, who wasted their precious opportunity to save themselves debating over the breed of the hunting dogs drawing near.

Translated by: Sheilagh Carey

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Substituting Yam, Yucca, and Cuban Ingenuity for Flour

Caption: Rationed bread sold in the neighborhood of Cojímar, east Havana. (Iliana Hernández)

14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 4 January 2019 — The old recipes from the Special Period are back in fashion. The lack of flour has led state-owned bakeries to turn to yams, private confectioners opt for recipes with yucca, and more than one family invents some substitute in order to have breakfast.

The shortage of flour has worsened in the last two months despite official promises of a prompt improvement. Cubans have become imbued with the spirit of Nitza Villapol, a well-known chef who, in the 90s, had to improvise dozens of dishes with few resources in front of the cameras of national television.

“For the end of the year we would like to make a panetela (cake) topped with meringue, but we have neither flour nor eggs, so we prefer some yucca buñuelos (fritters),” Silvia Domínguez, a Havana woman of 62 who fears that “the hard years” have returned, tells 14ymedio. The recipe for the dessert that the family finally made took an egg, at least, although they had to add a bit of vinegar with baking soda so that “it would be perfect.” continue reading

Croquettes have been one of the classic appetizers in the New Year’s Eve dinner of the Domínguez family, but this year they had to change the flour base for a puree of instant potatoes that they received from an emigrant relative. “When we don’t have it, we have to invent, and in the end we had a nice time at the celebration, but it’s very tiring having to do this every day,” she laments.

The national recipe book of recent decades has been marked by necesssity and it’s habitual that every Cuban knows how to fry an egg without oil, reach the consistency of a flan with half the eggs, or color a yellow rice with multivitamins bought at state-owned pharmacies. But in the case of flour, an ingredient included in many recipes, substitution is more difficult.

Leticia Romero doesn’t like the bread sold on the ration book and prefers to buy it in private bakeries in her neighborhood of Vedado or from unrationed sales at State-owned places, but since November both options have been difficult to find and this 56-year-old woman, who lives with her mother and her sister, has had to settle for the rationed product.

“When they first put it out for sale in the morning there are enormous lines and it’s a lot of work for me to stand in line, because I have to run to get to work,” laments Romero. Two months ago she always bought bread in the afternoons, when she was returning home, but now it’s impossible. “At that time the bakery is a desert and there’s nothing,” she explains to this newspaper.

After experiencing a severe crisis in bread sales at the national level in November and December, Havana has slightly recuperated production of this product in the bakeries of the rationed market and in those of the Cuban Bread Chain it’s possible to buy it at limited hours, although the supply is still not stable and the shortage of flours in stores persists.

In many of the bakery and confectionary businesses of the private sector in the capital, what’s available for sale has diminished. Outside one of them, close to Avenida 26, a customer says that now the only thing there is sweet and salty cookies. “Bread goes fast, those who have private cafes or restaurants take it by the box,” she insists.

In the province of Santiago de Cuba the supply of sweets and breads also improved during the past week, especially the unrationed sale. The government took great pains to improve the supply in the city where the principal ceremony for the 60th anniversary of the Cuban revolution was held. Now, Santiago residents, who also complain of the quality of the rationed product, fear that with the festivities over the supply will collapse.

Katherine Mojena, resident of the Altamira neighborhood, says that the rationed bread has a dark color and a bad flavor. “Those who know say that it’s made of flour from yams. The unrationed bread is not like that. At least not in the most central bakeries. There are almost never bread rolls which are the cheapest. The bread they do have is 3.50 CUP, which is bread with a hard crust, oval-shaped, which here for years we have called ’special’ bread. In convertible pesos there are some wonderful bread rolls: white, soft, a delicious flavor, and an excellent quality.”

In the bakery of Antilla, in the province of Holguín, a sign placed on the door reads: “There is no flour, Happy 2019.” Roberto Santana, a resident of the municipality who shared the image on social media, condemned the situation. “What happiness can there be in a town when the only bakery that sells unrationed bread puts up a sign like this at the beginning of the year? I don’t know whether to call it ignorance or blackmail of the people.”

“If the Government doesn’t pay providers and if they don’t lack bread on their tables, what do you call it? Surely it’s not social equality. This, my friends, is not socialism. There is no happiness without food,” added Santana.

An employee of the bakery, tired of having to give the same answer again and again to customers, explained this Friday via telephone to 14ymedio that the place is not offering any products because it lacks raw material. “Maybe it will come later,” she suggests.

Heriberto Núñez, a candy maker who distributes his merchandise in the municipality San Miguel del Padrón from an old Soviet-era bicycle, resists stopping his business because of the lack of flour. “I’m getting old bread from a state-owned canteen and I process it to make pudding,” he says. “I only need some grated lemon rind, powdered milk, and sugar to make a tasty product.” He doesn’t add eggs “because there aren’t any, not even in spiritual centers.”

Núñez assures that he has a long experience of substituting ingredients. “I worked many years selling tomato sauce the least of which was tomato, because I made it with beets, yams, and coloring,” he remembers. “I’m practiced in this, but if we also lose the old bread, then I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

In the plastic box he carries attached to his bicycle, this Wednesday he was transporting caramel coconut balls, peanut nougat, and yucca fritters. “Nothing with flour, and much less puff pastry sweets, which need quality ingredients. This is the time for sweets in syrup or sugared fruits, but for filled pastries we will have to wait.”

Translated by: Sheilagh Carey

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Etecsa Charges for But Then Blocks Messages for the "No" Vote and Abstention in the Referendum

Text messages with the phrases “YoVotoNO” (ImVotingNo), “YoNoVoto” (ImNotVoting), or with the word “abstention” are charged for by Etecsa but do not arrive to their destination. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 7 January 2019 — The battle to win the constitutional referendum of February 24 has led the Cuban Government to take all types of actions. Along with advertisements for “I’m voting Yes” at baseball games and the avalanche of messages of support on social media, it has opted for censorship of text messages that include calls to vote No or to abstain.

Mobile phone customers who have sent a text message with the phrases “YoVotoNo” (ImVotingNo), “YoNoVoto” (ImNotVoting), or with the word “abstention” (with or without the accent in the Spanish spelling) are indignant because the text never reached its recipient. 14ymedio has confirmed this situation with a test that included more than fifty users in ten provinces. continue reading

That test showed that combinations that include the numeral symbol, in the manner of hashtags on social media (#YoVotoNo and #YoNoVoto), are also “clipped” by the Telecommunications Company of Cuba (Etecsa), a state-owned monopoly that in the past has seen itself involved in other cases of censorship and of blocking telephone services against activists.

The contract that every user of Etecsa’s mobile network signs upon purchasing a mobile phone line includes a paragraph in which it makes clear that among the causes for the termination of service is that it be used for a purpose “that threatens morality, public order, the security of the State, or aids in committing criminal activities.”

However, no customer has been warned that messages will be submitted to a content filter or that part of their correspondence will be blocked if they mention the name of opposition figures, spread slogans uncomfortable for the government, or promote an electoral stance different from that of the government.

The current censorship of words and phrases does not extend to messaging services like WhatsApp, Telegram, or Facebook Messenger which the government cannot intercept in as easy a manner as it can control the text messages sent via Etecsa. For that reason many activists promoting “No” in the referendum or a voting boycott have moved toward these tools.

“I realized that something was happening because I went to send my sister who lives in Havana a message with the comment that a friend of mine made on Facebook about the referendum,” a cellphone user who wished to remain anonymous told 14ymedio. The text included the tag #YoNoVoto and never arrived to its destination, although the 0.9 CUC for the delivery was subtracted from the sender’s cellphone credit.

“After that I sent her various combinations of that same phrase and it was only delivered when I changed the ’o’ to a zero and I substituted the final vowel with a period,” says the source. “I spent the early morning hours checking with other friends and the result was the same,” the source concludes.

After that first claim, this newspaper communicated with the service number for Etecsa (118) to investigate what happened. The employee who answered the call insisted that there hadn’t been previous reports of problems with text messaging and emphasized that “Etecsa is not currently doing any maintenance work, so all messages should arrive on time.”

When asked directly about a possible censorship of text message content, the state-employed worker declined to respond and said she knew “nothing about that matter.” Other calls, made at different times this weekend, produced similar results.

It’s not the first time that Etecsa has censored messages based on content. In September this newspaper revealed in a comprehensive report that all text messages that contained references to “human rights,” “hunger strike,” “democracy,” “repression,” or the names of the most well-known activists in the country, were never received even though they were charged for.

At that time, 14ymedio did tests from accounts of very dissimular users, who ranged from opposition figures and activists to people with no links to independent movements. In all cases, messages that contained certain expressions were lost along the way.

Arnulfo Marrero, second in command at the Etecsa plant at 19 and B in Vedado, Havana, appeared at that time surprised by the complaint presented by two reporters from this newspaper. “We don’t have anything to do with that, you should address the Ministry of Communications (Micom),” explained the official.

“Micom is who governs the communications policy, because we here have no say. The only thing I can do is report this,” warned Marrero.

With more than five million cellphone users, Etecsa does not seem prepared to give in on the ideological control of the messages circulating on its network and continues to expand its extensive history of text message censorship via a “list of key words.” Now new terms have been added to that list of phrases and terms that, it seems, will continue to grow in the future.

Translated by: Sheilagh Carey

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I Am Voting No, But I Will Also Watch Over My Vote

The bill to reform the Cuban Constitution has been debated for months and will be voted on in a referendum in 2019. (EFE / Ernesto Mastrascusa)

14ymedio, Pedro Pablo Aguilera, Cali (Colombia), 3 January 2019 – After reading the article by Reinaldo Escobar, Is Fraud Possible February 24 Referendum? in 14ymedio, I feel it is more like a call to warn about a smokescreen of abstainers as a pretext to demobilize the negative vote that others advocate. I clarify: Reinaldo Escobar is convinced people should vote ’No’. That is to say, the Cuban opposition is divided again and it will be necessary to see who plays.

The truth is that voting ’No’ does not only not ratify the Constitution, it is a public rejection of the system, and all that means. It will be a petition for real change in the first chance that the system has mistakenly given voters the opportunity of a direct vote. The government has been overconfident and, as happened in Britain with the Brexit, in the US with Trump and in Colombia with the referendum of ratification of the Peace Accords, there may be an unexpected result. continue reading

The result of this latent division before the referendum will favor, without a doubt only the Government, which is already saying that voting ’No’ is an attitude of the enemy as if that option were not among those that they established themselves on the referendum ballot.

I am convinced, as are many others, to vote ’No’. It is the only clear path, it is the only thing that will make the rejection evident and it is even less risky in the face of the strong mechanisms of pressure and control of the Cuban electoral system. It is unlike an ambiguous abstention in which a person who may be sick, or traveling or clueless will join the “abstainer-on-purpose.” In addition, abstentions will not count towards the result, since those that will decide the outcome are the so-called valid votes.

The negative vote, voting ’No’, is easy, silent, and simple. Mark ’No’ on your ballot consistent with your thinking for the thousand and one reasons there are to do so.

Now, there is only one option for combatting fraud: Watching over the votes. And it is done with civility, with tranquility and respect, adhering to the current Cuban electoral rules.

It is necessary to know the rule, Law 72, where the rights and duties at the moment of the counting ballots are codified and by paying special attention to the Third Section, regarding the scrutiny in the polling stations.

This, in short, recognizes the right of citizens who wish to be present in the process of vote counting according to Article 112. In this process one must be very clear about the rules, rights and duties so as to not incur grounds for exclusion, such as those provided in article 171 regarding the alteration or destruction of printed materials or voting rolls.

It would be ideal to have one or two individuals, who in practice would be citizen observers, in each voting center or, at least in the largest of each municipality, who would oversee the electoral process by documenting via audio or video each table of poll workers.

Such a process, so common in the world, in the Cuban case gives an opening that we can use, but will require national or regional organization with national counting centers for monitoring, all within the limits established by Cuban law, since there will be many pretexts to avoid or block such access.

The fear is so great that there will be no lack of initiatives from the powerful to avoid the due compliance with the law, but that will be a violation of the rules of the alleged “socialist state of law.”

As such I think it is possible to protect the vote, but more important is the pedagogy of going to vote without anulling it, leaving it blank or abstaining. Vote and vote ’No’.

Thus, the results will be clearer and the false unanimity will at least be questioned, since we know that Cuba lacks an organized, committed and ethically responsible civil society.

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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The Mysterious Work at Paseo Avenue

A large house in Vedado is remodeled at a speed that generates suspicion among the neighbors. (14y medio)

14ymedio, Marcelo Hernandez, Havana, 10 January 2019 – In the midst of the critical housing situation in the country, where there is a deficit of close to one million homes, a pharaonic work of remodeling has been undertaken in Havana in a little over a month in a building in El Vedado that for years belonged to the Ministry of the Interior and whose destiny is unknown.

The block between Paseo Avenue and A Street and bounded by 11th and 13th streets has been fenced in. In the garden of the house trees have been cut and gigantic scaffolding erected. An army of bricklayers, plumbers and electricians undertake the total remodeling of the building while the crews of the electric company bury underground the installations for the lights that will surround the facility. continue reading

The streets and sidewalks have been converted into huge excavations where the telephone company and the gas and water suppliers seem to have agreed to have everything ready in record time. Near the construction site, the parked equipment features all types of machinery, those that right now are lacking in the construction of residential buildings and in the repair of the streets.

In several spots on the perimeter fence there are warnings that restrict passage and prohibit the taking of photographs.

When the workers are asked what will be the result of so much effort, they shrug their shoulders and put on the “I can’t say it” face. Is it true that a five-star hotel is being built here? The man looks over his shoulder before murmuring: “No, I heard that they are going to put a museum dedicated to honoring the memory of Fidel Castro” and with a voice almost inaudible, he adds: “With the need for one…”

Translated by Wilfredo Díaz Echevarria

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Septeto Santiaguero Concert Draws 30,000 People in Santiago de Cuba

When the music began in the concert tribute to Septeto Santiaguero there were about 30,000 spectators in the audience. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Ernesto Marín, Santiago de Cuba | 28 december 2018 — Despite the delay in starting, the Septeto Santiaguero concert that began Thursday night at the confluence of Trocha and Carretera del Morro, gave the audience a true musical marathon, with live streaming on the internet from several producers and private reporters.

The stage, popularly known as “the thermometer” of Cuban music, not only sheltered the Santiago group, which won this year and for the second time the Latin Grammy Award, but also a long list of guests, including the acclaimed Alexander Abreu and his Havana D’ Primera. continue reading

It was the quality of the artists that kept the audience from giving up after waiting for almost three hours for technical problems to be solved, which ended up postponing the first chords until midnight. When the music started, there were about 30,000 spectators in the audience.

Those unable to get there in person regretted that the concert of such a prestigious group in Santiago de Cuba was not covered by local television or broadcast live. On Friday morning only a small note in the Sierra Maestra newspaper reviewed the musical event of the previous night.

The situation was saved in part thanks to audience members and small private businesses that broadcast the show on Facebook Live and other streaming platforms. LiaVideos, a group dedicated to the independent cultural promotion, took the show through social networks and managed to raise the levels of the danceable “thermometer.”

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The "No" Campaign Gains Momentum Among the Opposition

Kiosks have begun to sell the text of the new Constitution. Here in Calle 23 in Havana’s Vedado neighborhood. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, January 8, 2019 — Mobilization for the “No” vote in the referendum called for February 24 to approve the constitutional reform continues gaining momentum in the ranks of the opposition.

This Monday, the leader of the Patriotic Union of Cuba (Unpacu), José Daniel Ferrer, insisted that a “No” vote “is the option championed by a wide number of opposition organizations, defenders of Human Rights, and other members of Independent Civil Society both within and without domestic territory” via a message published on his personal Facebook account.

Ferrer recognizes that none of the voter’s options on the referendum — Yes, No, abstention or a null vote — is going to democratize Cuba on its own, but he believes that authorities “would prefer a broad abstention” over “a broad turnout at the polls that gives rise to a massive and conclusive No, which can be demonstrated.” continue reading

José Daniel Ferrer, leader of the Patriotic Union of Cuba (Unpacu).

Ferrer counters those calling for boycotting the referendum via a massive abstention with the argument that in a dictatorship people don’t participate in elections and reminds his audience of five cases in which an electoral process derailed a regime, among them Augusto Pinochet’s Chile and communist Poland.

“For someone who is very knowledgeable about the Cuban — and international –reality, it’s not the most effective option [abstention],” believes Ferrer, “unless those who champion it as the only valid form have the ability to mobilize, and demonstrate that they did it, with more than 50% of Cubans with the right to vote.”

The opposition figure called on those supporting abstention to join forces and work together with those who promote voting No, although he also warned that “with those who hold paralyzed and sectarian positions, because of orders or malice, no understanding can exist” and he branded them “very good allies of tyranny.”

The Unpacu leader also calls in his message to “together defend the right of Cubans of the diaspora to participate” in the referendum and “in any question of interest for the country.”

Furthermore, the Cuban Observatory for Human Rights (OCDH) has asked the European Parliament, United Nations, and the Organization of American States (OAS) to send observers to supervise and give guarantees of the process, according to a statement published this Monday by the organization.

OCDH, headquartered in Madrid, has recommended that the three international bodies “supervise the process and prevent fraud by Havana’s regime” so that “the regime doesn’t have a free hand to change popular will,” says the letter sent to Antonio Tajana, president of the European Parliament.

The petition was also sent to members of European Parliament Antonio López Istúriz, Beatriz Becerra, María Teresa Giménez Barbat, Javier Nart, Pavel Telicka, and Dita Charanzova, among others.

The letter to European Parliament asks that the behavior of Cuban authorities be taken into account “at the time of examining whether to maintain or suspend the Agreement for Political Dialogue and Cooperation with the Island.”

In December 2016 the European Union and Cuba signed their first bilateral agreement, for political dialogue and cooperation, that put an end to the European Union’s “Common Position,” which, as of 1996, imposed on the bloc a unilateral and restrictive relationship with the Island.

Although Cuba is not part of the OAS, OCDH sent a similar missive to Luis Almagro, secretary general of the body, seeking for “the region’s nations to send delegations of impartial observers” to the Island. “The drafting and review process of the new Constitution of the Republic of Cuba has been exclusionary, conceived by and for the Communist Party of Cuba, which has written and imposed its version of the Law that will rule the destiny of the Cuban nation,” reminds the text.

In the petition directed to Michelle Bachelet, United Nations High Commissioner ofor Human Rights, OCDH underlines the importance of what will happen on February 24 when “the Cuban people are called to approve, or not, a proposal that could jeopardize their future.”

The Observatory, which along with other organizations supports the #YoVotoNo (#ImVotingNo) campaign, warns that that will be “a day of mobilization, complicated and tense.”

Translated by: Sheilagh Carey

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Final Text Published of Cuban Constitution That Will Go To A Referendum on 24 February

The official campaign for “Yes” begins with a blank page in the State newspaper Granma. (Screen Capture)

14ymedio, Havana, 5 January 2018 — This Saturday the official media has published the final text of the new Constitution that will go to referendum on February 24. The document comes to light 15 days after it was approved by the National Assembly pf People’s Power during its last session in 2018.

The final text again includes the term “communism,” maintains the controversial Article 5 that consecrates the Communist Party as “organized vanguard of the nation” and ensures that “the concentration of property in natural or legal non-state persons is regulated by the State,” a point also criticized. continue reading

The new Constitution has Many more articles than the current one adopted 1976: 229 against 141, which had dropped to 137 with the last reform of the Constitution in 2002.

The name of Fidel (Castro) appears three times in its different forms: “Fidel” in the preamble, “Fidel Castro Ruz” and “fidelista”; while (José) Martí appears four times in various forms. The word “communist” or “communism” is mentioned five times in the document.

The issue of equal marriage, which had aroused so many passions in the debates, was postponed in a transitory provision: “the National Assembly of People’s Power will, within two years of the Constitution, initiate the process of popular consultation and referendum of the draft Family Code, in which the form of what constitutes marriage must appear.”

On December 28, the 17 members of the National Electoral Commission (CEN) who will organize the referendum were sworn in at the Capitol of Havana. The entity includes members of the Armed Forces and is chaired by Alina Balseiro, who led the parliamentary elections process concluded in 2018.

Previously, the 583 deputies present during the vote on the Constitution unanimously approved the text after a week of debates in which the proposed changes to the constitutional project were discussed, after a three-month consultation process in which the ruling party says that nearly nine million Cubans participated, including residents and emigrants.

The official press has announced that in the course of next week, the state-owned company Correos de Cuba “will put up for sale in all its units and newsstands, the Constitution of the Republic”, at the price of 1 CUP (national currency, approximately 4¢ US) . The document will have a tabloid format and will have 16 pages.

The Government and pro-government organizations are strongly promoting the ’Yes’ campaign in state media, sports broadcasts and social networks. So far no space has been given in the press or national television to the standard-bearers of the ’No’ campaign, despite the fact that social networks and political activism are developing a broad campaign for a ’No’ vote or for the boycott of the referendum.

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Revolution is Disappointment

The 60th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution was celebrated in Santa Ifigenia cemetery, a few yards from the tomb of Fidel Castro, the large rock seen in the background of the photo. (Granma)

14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez, Havana | 9 January 2019 — As a gesture of profound symbolism, on January 1 the official ceremony to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the triumph of the Cuban Revolution was held in the cemetery of Santa Ifigenia in Santiago de Cuba. More than the birthday of a living thing, its defenders gathered around the cadaver of a process, the tomb of a utopia.

The official slogans commemorated that six decades ago the “bearded ones” came down from the Sierra Maestra and burst onto the national life, but this doesn’t mean that the country has been in a process of renewal this entire time. It remains a task for academics to determine the date on which the original purposes were betrayed, but in day-to-day life it is easy to see that the Revolution has become a cadaver.

Like an earthquake or a hurricane, the process that began in 1959 rumbled for a short time, but the consequences of that initial impulse have extended over time and determined the lives of millions of people. The winds generated devastated generations and molded the mentality of an entire people. Its repressive death throes have affected everyone with more intensity and gravity than the benefits of its so-called social “conquests.”

Its repressive death throes have affected everyone with more intensity and gravity than the benefits of its so-called social “conquests.”

Now, although the government insists on continuing to call the political, economic and social situation we have experienced the “Cuban Revolution,” any study of history can find notably differentiated periods in which the paradigms, purposes, and above all the timelines to fulfill the initial promise of a luminous future, have changed. The chronology of disappointment has more dates than the one that marks moments of satisfaction.

Now it is almost obligatory to prepare an accounting that contrasts the achievements and failures, above all to respond to the question whether so many sacrifices, deaths, loss of rights, exoduses and imprisonments are equal to what has been achieved, or – at least – what has been proclaimed as accomplishments. Was it worth it to turn a nation upside down, tear apart its economy and redefine it, and push millions of the children of this land into exile?

Throughout the first three decades, the expressly stated purpose of the process was to “build socialism” and specifically the system described in the manuals of the Soviet academy, from which it was not possible to deviate a millimeter under pain of incurring the grave the sin of revisionism. Those were the times of drawing the future in bright colors and demanding the absolute sacrifice of Cubans for the sake of that ideal.

When the system collapsed in Eastern Europe, the Island’s authorities rushed to add the possessive pronoun “our” to socialism, and from that point any transgression of the dogma was allowed. They reworked the project to fit into the new historic context and, with this work of putting make-up on it, betrayed their most orthodox followers. That was when the Revolution died for those who hadn’t yet buried it during the exodus of the Mariel Boatlift in 1980, Fidel Castro’s support for the Soviet tanks in Prague in 1968, or the massive executions by firing squad of the first years.

A dozen octogenarians, self-proclaimed as the historic generation begin to prepare their withdrawal

In the early nineties of the last century, and without an explanation based in Marxist theory, the religious of any denomination were invited to join the Communist Party; private businesses – which had been exterminated and demonized in the Revolutionary Offensive of 1968 – were permitted; and to top off the heresies, since there was no longer the “pipeline” of subsides coming from the Soviet Union, it was considered necessary and profitable to accept and promote foreign investments, obviously from capitalist countries.

The precepts of the trashy “egalitarianism” that had molded the social reality during the first steps of the process ran up against the reality of the rise of the new rich and the fact that the State could not guarantee a rationed market that could cover people’s needs, nor a system of material privileges to win loyalty. Money resumed its value as a medium of exchange, and to the extent that foreign tourism arrived on the island the dollar delineated the new face of daily life on the Island.

With enthusiasm exhausted and the illusion that the revolutionary process could offer a dignified life to every Cuban extinguished, only repression remained to maintain control. The conquests in public services, such as education and healthcare, also suffered a frank deterioration and today languish under the problems of infrastructure, excessive ideologicalization and large ethical gaps.

Nor is the original leader alive. The years of the permanent call to action and the perennial mobilization imposed by Fidel Castro have been left behind. His brother, Raul Castro, tried to impose pragmatism during his mandate, but barely managed to unlock some legal absurdities, for example allowing Cubans to travel, or to buy and sell their homes and cars. His successor, Miguel Diaz-Canel, can’t get past the discourse of continuity, even though he dresses in shirt sleeves and appears, for the first time in more than half a century, accompanied by a first lady.

Hence, the 60th anniversary is celebrated at a crucial moment. A dozen octogenarians, survivors of purges, heart attacks and accidents, self-proclaimed as the historical generation of the Revolution, begin to prepare their withdrawal and accept the inescapable reality that they need a relief player. The new wolves in the litter show their hands free of the blood and confiscations, as they swear allegiance and promise to sustain continuity at any price.

The permanent call to action and the perennial mobilization imposed by Fidel Castro have been left behind

At the moment, the most notorious and transcendent fact that leaves its mark on the sixtieth birthday is the new Constitution of the Republic. A list of articles that seeks to leave the system “well secured” against potential heirs who might want to dare to change something. It is the road map of immobility, the rigid and unappealable political testament of a process that once boasted of renovation and irreverence.

The text of the new Constitution has been promoted as a way to adapt the initial purposes of social justice to the new times imposed by the 21st century. However, it is clearly a set of regulations to tie the hands of any reformer who attempts to change course. It is not wings for the future but an anchor firmly sunk in the past, a dead weight labeled “revolutionary.”

In its articles are enshrined the “irrevocability of socialism” and the role of the Communist Party as society’s maximum leading force, a clear example of the conservative will – a negation of the revolutionary spirit– that has dominated the regime for a long time. It is the last gesture to try to control from the tomb of the Cuban Revolution the life that continues to flow out here. A corpse that seeks to regulate each step, each breath, as if the coffin of history could condition the future.

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This article was originally published in the Spanish newspaper El País.

"El Gallego" Fernandez Dies, a Man of Proven Loyalty

José Ramón Fernández was born in Santiago de Cuba on November 4, 1923. (Cubadebate)

14ymedio, Havana, 6 January 2019 — In the early hours of this Sunday, José Ramón El Gallego (The Galician) Fernández passed away in Havana at the age of 95, Granma newspaper reported in its digital version, after long months of the public absence of the official, including from the session of the National Assembly last December in which the text of the new Constitution was approved.

Fernández was born in Santiago de Cuba on 4 November 1923 and was the son of Asturians — despite the nickname that later defined him — his natural father was from Morcín and his mother from Oviedo. In 1940 he enlisted in the Constitutional Army of the Island where he came to hold the rank of Second Lieutenant. continue reading

Closely linked to sports, he ventured into horse riding, shooting, basketball, baseball and softball. He studied and graduated from the Artillery School of Cuba and also from the United States Army Academy in Fort Sill, Oklahoma.

In 1952, after Fulgencio Batista’s coup d’etat, he led a group of official professors, lieutenants and captains in the Cadet School, who joined in the “Conspiracy of the Pure.” In 1956 he was tried for rebellion and sentenced to 4 years, 2 months and 21 days in prison.

In the Isle of Pines prison he had contact with members of the 26th of July Movement, the Popular Socialist Party, the Revolutionary Directorate and the Triple A. In January 1959 he was released after the victory of the rebels led by Fidel Castro and joined the new group of leaders of the country.

From that moment he held different responsibilities in the Armed Forces and the Government — he was Minister of Education — as well as serving on the Cuban Olympic Committee. He was a member of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party and a Deputy to the National Assembly of People’s Power. When he died he was Adviser to the President of the Councils of State and of Ministers.

Many consider him “the architect” of the victory of Playa Girón — the Bay of Pigs — in which he participated and for which he used the military knowledge he had accumulated in his years in the army and academies in Cuba and the United States.

In all the responsibilities he carried out during the last 60 years, he was characterized by an extreme loyalty towards Fidel and Raúl Castro. A man of few words, he was seen as a “hard” by his subordinates and when he died he was part of a very small group of octogenarians and nonagenarians who make up the waning “historical generation.”

According to his wishes, his remains will be cremated and “later there will be information regarding the organization of funeral honors,” says the brief note published in the Granma newspaper.

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