Regina Coyula, 7 August 2015 — The mindless display of opulence bothers me ethically and aesthetically. But I have nothing against enrichment from legal sources and from the effort, talent, or ability of the individual.
The Cuban government takes a hypocritical position. On the one hand it is trying to prevent at all costs the personal enrichment of the emerging private entrepreneur class, subjecting them to restrictions and imposing inordinate taxes. On the other hand—not having ever experienced any of the restrictions suffered by the average citizen—it now aims to attract fresh foreign capital (accumulated in their home countries thanks to the absence of restrictive regulations like those imposed in ours) and also the tourism of the rich and famous, some of whom we have already seen parading through Cuba.
Somos+, 20 July 2015 — In 2014 the organization Reporters Without Borders released a list of “100 Heroes of Information.” They are journalists from 65 nations who have denounced crimes against humanity. From 25 to 75 years of age, they report from the most solid democracies to the most authoritarian regimes. They are brave men and women who have suffered gunfire, bombs, and torture in order to show the truth to the world.
Even countries where freedom of expression is respected have produced heroes. Journalists Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras displayed to American and British citizens the surveillance methods used by their intelligence services. continue reading
Others like Dawit Isaac bore the brunt of the most authoritarian countries in the world. The African journalist has spent over 13 years in the prisons of the dictator Isaias Afeworki in Eritrea, a nation near the Horn of Africa. In 2014 the country ranked last in the World Ranking of Freedom of the Press.
These journalists confront governments as well as the mafias. Many of them have revealed the activities of organized crime in Sicily, Chechnya, Bulgaria, Vietnam, and Malaysia. Those who want to know their names and their stories can read them on the website of Reporters Without Borders. a??
There are also Cubans on this list. They are Angel Santiesteban Prats, punished for his criticism by imprisonment, and Yoani Sánchez for covering social and economic problems in Cuba.
Today we have much independent Cuban media. Thanks to them, we learn the small and concealed news stories, what goes on in every corner of the island. From them we learned of the death of a 14-year-old in a building collapse in central Havana. Media like ICLEP and DiariodeCuba.com delivered us this news on August 27, 2014. And reminded us that the poor condition of the buildings is not just a problem of comfort, but a constant danger to human lives.
Yusnaby Perez’s blog, with a modern and entertaining style, also gives us an incredible x-ray view of life on the streets. This is journalism, the weapon against impotence, against what upsets us. But it also has its critics. David Randall, a journalist with twenty years of experience as an editor and publisher in Europe and Africa says:
“Undoubtedly the history of journalism abounds with sloppy work and bad intentions, but it includes a long series of examples that prove how the great successes of the profession are even more abundant, and are a source of pride.”
These shortcomings that often capture journalism are also the result of what we ask or fail to ask. The stories of Reporters Without Borders show that even democratic countries can have challenges to free expression. And that censorship in authoritarian countries can never block those who decide to seek the truth. Between repressive governments and ruthless mafias, reporters make a way to break the news.
It is not enough for the brave to do their job. We must also reach out to them. If we become citizens who seek the truth like water in the desert, censorship will not have much maneuvering room.
We must encourage good journalism. If we prefer biased news and speculations, the press will have to capitulate to the media show. The news media can only do a bad job if we settle for superficial information.
What good does it do journalists to take risks to discover the truth, showing the facts from every angle and portraying reality to the maximum, if no one is going to read it?
It has always been challenging for Cubans, both outside and inside, to find out the truth, but we also have the means. Whether by going on the internet, watching a foreign channel, or hearing by word of mouth, there are always ways to learn what is happening.
Christiane Amanpour, CNN’s chief correspondent, specially assigned to dozens of wars and conflicts, says:
“I firmly believe that we journalists, with our papers and pens, with laptops and satellite connections, cameras and television crews, can make a difference, we can help make the world a better place.”
In their book Why Nations Fail, academics James Robinson and Daron Acemoglu say the media are critical to achieving democracy and therefore economic growth. Elections can sometimes malfunction and politics can be corrupted. But whenever there is a defiant press, the vicious circle can be broken.
Somos+, 24 July 2015 — After the announcement of Cuba / USA relations on December 17, it is not surprising that some of the major news networks are interested in the evolution of the historic rapprochement. This is the case with PBS, which since last month has been conducting a series of reports in Havana under the name “Cuban Evolution.”
On June 17, the official website of PBS published the video presented below, focusing primarily on the poor internet access on the Island compared to the rest of the Western Hemisphere, the populace’s expectations of change, and control of the mass media by the Cuban government.
Manuel Mons, a member of Somos+ (We Are More) in Cuba, was one of those interviewed.
Iván García, 7 July 2105 — In the Cuba of the Castros one thing is certain: the role of the people is to applaud, accept, and await the executive edicts. So long as the boring newspaper Granma does not confirm a news item, then reports about it are false.
The secretive handling of the press by the autocracy has far exceeded the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and its official news agency TASS. If in Moscow it took three days after Brezhnev’s death to announce it to the people, in Cuba some news can take a month to be acknowledged.
In other cases, the people never find out. Cubans know little or nothing about the transfer of weapons to North Korea, or that Antonio Castro, Fidel’s son and playboy of the olive-green bourgeoisie, won a golf tournament in Varadero. As far as the state media is concerned, Rihanna, Beyonce, and Paris Hilton did not visit the island. continue reading
Researchers charged with collecting information about the Special Period, a static economic crisis that lasted for 25 years, can gather nothing by reviewing the official press: the news of the time overflowed with optimism; it did not report on shortages, but only highlighted popular support for the Revolution.
In the field of information, Cuba is stuck in a third dimension. The rumor mill has become a science. On the street, the average Cuban can expect to learn of the arrest of a minister, that another baseball player jumped over the wall, and that the general has a journalist girlfriend. They learn these things by other means.
This summer’s drama is the case Yulieski Gourriel, probably the last great star of Cuban baseball. By numbers, Gourriel is the best player on the Island. A five-tool player.
In 2014 he was hired by the Japan Professional League where he performed remarkably. But this season he breached his contract by not reporting in to the organization, claiming injury.
Officials of the Yokohama DeNa BayStar nine asked Gourriel to travel to Japan to be evaluated by team doctors. Yulieski did not show up, simply preferring to recuperate at home.
They imposed a heavy fine and canceled the contract. Yulieski himself started feeding rumors when on April 5 he posted on his Facebook wall a cryptic note that said “Things happen for a reason. What is coming could be better. “
Because everything in Cuba is covered by a shroud of mystery, little can learned about Gourriel’s intentions. According to ball players in Havana, Yulieski married a granddaughter of Raul Castro.
For reasons unknown, Yulieski withdrew from participating in the selection of the national team for the upcoming international events. Something unprecedented. And that could result in his being sanctioned by the Cuban Baseball Federation.
On the Panorama Sports program of Radio Rebelde, reporters of the caliber of Ramon Rivera and Luis Alberto Izquierdo received emails and phone calls from fans asking about Gourriel.
The state journalists belong to the ideological sector and are considered “soldiers of the Revolution.” Rivera and Izquierdo did some semantic juggling to try to please their listeners. They called Yulieski’s house and the phone is out of service.
Clearly, the State, its ministers, spokespeople, and leaders disparage the official press. They hide information, don’t offer interviews, and cavalierly ignore them.
This is silly, because if the partisan press is unable to meet the people’s expectations of the news, the people will seek information through other channels. And that’s been happening for a long time.
Gourriel’s case serves to connect to another issue that leaves the official press dangling. On Friday June 19, the national television news announced with great fanfare the opening, on the 23rd, of 35 new Wi-Fi access points in several localities.
On the appointed day I went to La Rampa, where according to the news report there would be a wireless zone from the Yara Theater to the Malecon. It was all a hoax. Zero connections.
I went to the ETECSA commercial office in the basement of the Focsa Building on M Street between 17th and 19th in Vedado, to investigate the matter. Most of the employees were unaware of the information.
An engineer told me that the service would began on July 1. So why did the news announce its start on June 23? “Those people are clueless. They say what the uninformed officials say. Because of technical problems, the network still isn’t up,” he replied.
They are still selling internet-browsing cards at 4.50 CUC an hour, although it was announced that as of June 23 they would be reduced to 2 convertible pesos. “No one has told us about this reduction. Until it’s printed in the Gazette it’s not official,” said an employee.
The regime leaves the press that it sponsors in a very bad way.
Yulieski, the State, and Raul Castro should learn that public information is not a private preserve. It is a civil right.
New York | June 26, 2014 — The organization Human Rights Watch, in a letter to the foreign ministers of several Latin American nations, today called on the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) “to urge the Venezuelan government to immediately address the grave human rights situation in the country.”
The letter is the corollary to a report by the organization titled “Punished for Protesting: Human Rights Violations in the Streets, Detention Centers, and Justice System of Venezuela,” about the situation in the South American country since the start of the demonstrations on February 12.
“While various international organizations, including human rights rapporteurs of the United Nations and the European Parliament, have expressed concern about human rights violations in Venezuela, UNASUR has not condemned the serious abuses committed by Venezuelan state agents,” said the letter from José Miguel Vivanco, Director for the Americas at Human Rights Watch. continue reading
The letter was sent to foreign ministers Héctor Timerman of Argentina, Luiz Alberto Figueiredo Machado of Brazil, Heraldo Muñoz of Chile; Maria Angela Holguin of Colombia, Ricardo Patino of Ecuador; Gonzalo Gutierrez Reinel of Peru, and Luis Almagro of Uruguay.
Citing “the absence of an independent judiciary in Venezuela that can curb government abuses . . .” the letter “urges the Administration of (President Nicolas) Maduro to protect the rights of the protesters,” referring to the UNASUR Constitutional Treaty of 2008.
The treaty provides that “the founding of the South American union is based on the guiding principles of democracy, citizen participation and pluralism, (and) universal, indivisible, and interdependent human rights,” the letter recalled from the organization in defense of human rights.
In its report, Human Rights Watch highlights abuses that occurred during demonstrations in Venezuela and documents how the National Guard, the Bolivarian National Police, and state police forces have “routinely applied illegitimate force against unarmed protesters and even bystanders.”
According to the organization, some of the attacks carried out by Venezuelan security forces included “severe beatings and the indiscriminate discharge of firearms, shotguns, and tear gas into crowds.”
The report also notes that “in many cases, detainees were held incommunicado at military bases for 48 hours or longer before being brought before a judge,” and that during that time suffered mistreatment that “clearly constituted torture.”
“Venezuela has responded to protests by resorting to excessive use of force, and judicial officials have been complicit in abuses committed by members of the security forces. Dialogue is now stagnant, and the intervention of UNASUR has not led to concrete results to improve the human rights situation in the country,” asserts Human Rights Watch.
They add that the abuses have gone beyond citizens to affect “journalists and others who photographed and filmed the repression,” the report concludes.
The document notes that President Maduro and the Venezuelan Attorney General, Luisa Ortega Díaz, have recognized that members of the security forces committed human rights violations, and have publicly undertaken to investigate these cases, but Human Rights Watch believes that “there is reason to doubt the credibility of these investigations.”
How the worldwide media reported on the birth of this newspaper and its subsequent censorship on the island
14ymedio, June 21, 2014
Hours before 14ymedio was born, the Spanish newspaper El Mundo published a column by Gina Montaner, “14ymedio’ against ’55ymedio” contrasting the name of our yet unborn daily with the long years that the island lived submerged not only in a lack of information, but also under institutionalized disinformation. Montaner emphasized one of the challenges to the Cuban press, so different from those faced by the international media: “In Cuba everything is up for grabs and the real revolution—the technological one accompanied by freedom of expression—is one of the great challenges of the post-Castro period.” The Cuban journalist added: “If Cubans get access to ‘14ymedio’, it will be a breath of fresh air compared to the nauseating ‘Battle of ldeas’ of the government media.”
A few minutes after 8 a.m. Cuban time this past May 21st, 14ymedio was visible in all the countries of the world. But on the island it could only be seen for a little over an hour. Then, our website was diverted to another address where they tried to discredit the director of 14ymedio. continue reading
The international press reported this blockage. The prestigious American newspaper The Wall Street Journal ran a headline on the 22nd, “ Cuban Dissident Starts Website, Which Is Promptly Hacked.” “Cuba’s government explicitly bars any printed material that it interprets as a threat, so there are no independent newspapers,” noted the newspaper. But despite the lack of internet access in the island, said the writer, the new website “poses a direct challenge to the Cuban regime’s almost total control of information.”
A day after the 14ymedio blockade the Inter-American Press Association (SIP) issued a statement denouncing the situation, which was reproduced by several outlets, including El Nuevo Herald. “While the measure is not surprising, the world expected more tolerance from the government of Raul Castro, considering his efforts to show a more positive, more open image in order to garner more respect from the international community,” it said in a statement setting out the SIP’s views on freedom of expression.
The blockade was lifted briefly on May 24, the day of the publication of a long commentary in the newspaper Granma, which denounced the “project of the counterrevolutionary blogger Yoani Sánchez to create a digital media outlet.” Several international media outlets reproduced 14ymedio’s tweet encouraging Cubans to “read us before the next blockage,” which indeed occurred a few days later. Since then Cubans have had to go back to this newspaper by anonymous proxies that hide the IP of the computer, to prevent the identification of the source of the connection.
On June 2nd the Nuevo Herald of Miami spotlighted the “battle against censorship” in a series dedicated to 14ymedio. Further from our borders, various European media announced the birth of 14ymedio: the British BBC; El Pais in Spain (which published a report last May 22 titled “Birth of the free press in Cuba” and on June 15 interviewed its director); and La Repubblica in Italy, among others. The leading French newspaper, Le Monde, also ran a note to explain the blockade suffered on the island. The title it chose, “Cuba: le premier média numérique bloqué independant dès are lancement” (“Cuba’s first independent online newspaper blocked at its release”), angered some of the independent publications that came before, but from the outset 14ymedio has acknowledged the work of its predecessors.
In Mexico, the daily La Razon devoted considerable space to 14ymedio, reprinting an article most representative of the its writing as part of a piece titled “They Have Resources for a Year and 11 Journalists.” “The editorial staff is composed of 11 persons including Yoani and her husband, Reinaldo Escobar, a journalist with extensive experience, who worked with the official press, but left 30 years ago. Other team members are young Cubans, mostly under 30 years old,” said the newspaper, which also republished the first story run in 14ymedio, “Red Dawn: Havana is Killing Out There.”
14ymedio, Havana | June 23, 2014 — The Cuban economy is growing at a rate slower than the official forecasts, according to data announced by the Minister of Economy and Planning, Adel Yzquierdo Rodriguez. He said that during the first half of this year the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) will increase by just 0.6%, but will improve during the following months to an increase of 1.4% by the end of the year. However, independent analysts question these expectations and believe they are not a realistic reflection of the state of the economy.
The Cabinet last Saturday presented details about “the difficulties that continue to damage the Cuban economy.” Rodriguez blamed the failure of the Plan’s objectives on the “adverse weather conditions” and “the complex international situation.”
The Minister of Finance and Prices, Lina Pedraza Rodriguez, noted a substantial drop in productivity in 124 companies, which had planned a positive balance but ultimately had losses.
At the meeting, the ministers also addressed the issue of monetary unification. The head of the Permanent Commission for Implementation and Development, Marino Murillo Jorge, explained that this measure “will not by itself solve all the problems of the economy,” but requires the implementation of other policies aimed at increasing the efficiency and level of productivity of labor.
In addition, the officials said that, at the end of May, around 467,000 people were self-employed, but they have not provided any statistics on the high number of the self-employed who have ceased their activities.
14ymedio, Placetas | June 22, 2014 — The activist Jorge Luis Garcia Perez, known as Antúnez, was released last Friday with an injunction that prevents him from leaving the municipality of Placetas without permission. His arrest last Sunday at 10:30 p.m. generated many expressions of concern and solidarity from the Cuban dissident community.
The activist must answer in court for an alleged crime of “public disorder,” for which a file was opened in preparatory phase, case number 651 2014. Initially Antúnez was threatened with being charged with “contempt for the figure of Fidel Castro,” but that charge was later discarded.
If he fails to obey the injunction Antunez could be imprisoned. His current legal situation also prevents him from traveling outside Cuba.
June 11, 2014 (With information from El Nuevo Herald and EFE) – The number of dancers from the National Ballet of Cuba who have defected to the United States has increased to nine. Jaime Reytor joins the eight members of the company that fled last weekend in Puerto Rico and are already in Miami. The artists revealed Wednesday that they decided to defect from the island because “there is no future for young people.” They will perform next Sunday with the Cuban Classical Ballet of Miami at a gala dedicated to the Russian ballet.
Eight dancers (Jorge Oscar Sanchez, Raizel Cruz, Carlos Ignacio Galindez, Ariel Soto, Monica Gomez, Yaima Mendez, Lisette Santander and Yinet Fernandez) participated in a press conference organized by the Cuban Classical Ballet of Miami, in which they described their flight from the City of San Juan in Puerto Rico, where they were to participate in the show “The Magic of Dance,” where the Cuban director of art education, Alicia Alonso, was to be present.
“This is the country of the future. There are many options for work and places to choose from. We came here in order to dance and we will dance,” Jorge Oscar Sanchez, age 23, told EFE. He decided not to return to Cuba but to stay in the United States “in search of opportunities,” despite his sadness “at leaving behind family and friends,” because on the island “there is no future for young people.” continue reading
Since 2007, at least 35 dancers have sought asylum in the U.S. and other countries, according to figures from the Cuban Classical Ballet of Miami. The artistic director of the company, Pedro Pablo Peña, said the steady drip of defections shows “the absolute discontent” of artists with the Cuban regime.
“At first I was a little nervous because it was a very strong impact. It was leaving your family behind to go and find your profession, to be a dancer . . . It’s very hard. I keep thinking about my family,” said Ariel Soto. “They didn’t give us the opportunity of showing us how to reach our potential. I didn’t want to be frustrated because I have a life ahead of me. I’m 23 years old and I want to grow and not stagnate,” he said.
Another dancer, Yaima Mendez admitted that “I’ve been working since I was a child, and could not see the final result of that sacrifice” and that “it always hurts. It’s something very tough, very heavy, but I needed it to fulfill my dreams in a big country.”
According to Raizel Cruz, all dancers in Cuba support the decision of any artist who defects. “I dance, but I come with the mindset of doing anything. Whatever it takes,” he said.
According to the América Tevé channel, Cuban tennis players Randy Blanco (age 21) and Ernesto Alfonso (age 24), who participated in the Davis Cup elimination rounds, also held in Puerto Rico, fled and arrived yesterday at Miami International Airport.
Havana, June 9, 2014, Victor Ariel Gonzalez — Corrugated fiber-cement sheets and wooden planks form a security fence in the shadow of the two tallest buildings of an iconic Havana site: the “Twin Towers” at Texas Corner, where 240 families live, marooned, as the buildings crumble.
Every day many people walk past, where the sidewalks of Calzada Del Cerro and Diez de Octubre intersect. Life goes on as usual at the foot of the gray structures, 20 floors and 200 feet high, which dangerously dominate the landscape.
A glance behind the makeshift wall leaves no doubt about the problem: chunks of rust-stained concrete detached from the walls are scattered in the grass, evidence of the deterioration of the buildings. If you look up, the poor state of the structural walls, which support thousands of tons, is revealed, with their broken edges and numerous areas where rebar is exposed. continue reading
The corrosion causes the metal framework inside the concrete to expand, creating pressure on the covering, cracking and loosening pieces. People say the concrete is “bursting.” This is inevitable in construction using low-quality materials or inadequate technology in the concrete-fabricating process. The phenomenon now affects both 20-story structures on Texas Corner.
An unpredictable and deadly shower of concrete hailstones weighing several pounds
With rust replacing metal, the reinforcing steel loses its structural strength, which is its sole purpose. The building weakens, significantly shortening its useful life. Those who inhabit the buildings are at risk, but not only them. Before the agency responsible for repairing properties extended the protective perimeter in October 2013, passersby were exposed to an unpredictable and deadly shower of concrete hailstones weighing several pounds.
Children play after school in the portion of the park remaining outside the fence. A neighbor, whose little granddaughter is running around there, recalls that construction of the towers was completed in 1992: “I myself participated in the work because during that time I was in the micro.” She is referring to the “microbrigades,” crews of unskilled laborers who built multifamily housing in exchange for a place to live. “They gave me an apartment here, but I’ve always had problems. The windows don’t keep the rain out.”
She remembers that the south tower was built entirely by prisoners, while the north was under the control of those who would be the future owners. In both cases, the work left much to be desired technically. “One time they came around collecting money to retouch the exterior bearing walls, but the people wouldn’t agree because the windows were going to stay the same and the problem was not really going to be solved.” That was several years ago.
Now emergency intervention is needed. But those who installed the fence in only a few days—supposedly the same ones who would repair the towers—have not continued the work, which has been postponed indefinitely. The residents have not been informed of a date for the work to be done. The months go by and the risk increases every day as the corrosion silently advances.
In Havana, travelers bound for the provinces don’t just say goodbye from the platform, they wage a daily battle for survival
Lilanne Ruiz, Havana / June 4, 2014 – It’s seven p.m. in Havana. The train to Guantanamo has just arrived at Central Station. “Let’s go, have your tickets ready!” the conductor shouts, while inching open the gate to the platform.
The travelers push forward, some carrying all their luggage, others squeezing through and waiting for a family member to pass their boxes and suitcases to them through the bars. “Take care, I’ll call when you get there,” says a voice. Only the passengers can get to the cars. No one complains. They’ve never lived the classic scene of saying goodbye from the platform to someone departing on a train.
The Central Railway Station in Havana is an imposing building, built in 1912. The deteriorated ceilings are propped up by wood in the platform-access areas. Despite the neglect, the building endures and impresses.
In the lounge several rows of seats are arranged without a view of anything. It seems like an immense classroom, but without a teacher or blackboard. You can’t see the platform, only the wall. It is a lifeless scene, that gives no sense of movement nor help to make the wait enjoyable. continue reading
There are only 11 weekly trains to meet the demand. For the eastern region, those to Guantanamo, Santiago de Cuba, and Bayamo-Manzanillo, depart every three days. Those are the biggest, with 10 or 12 cars of 72 seats each. For the route to the center of the island, there’s one to Sancti Spiritus and one to Cienfuegos. Another goes to Pinar del Rio and five smaller ones travel to Guines and Los Palos, in Mayabeque .
Travelers who gather at Central Station, uniformed in poverty, are forced to improvise. They dress with what they can and assemble their luggage from what’s available. Briefcases, sealed plastic buckets, cardboard boxes covered with tape. If they can carry it, they bring it.
The figures of Ministry of the Interior (MININT) officials in battle dress stand out. They are armed. It is not known if they will be traveling or if they are patrolling. One of them, sitting two benches to my right, drinks from a bottle of homemade wine. He works in Havana but lives in the east. He goes on vacation every five months and returns to see his family. In the boxes, he says, he’s carrying packages of macaroni, spaghetti, and crackers that he’ll sell at the military unit before leaving.
Shipping ground coffee from the eastern part of the country is a crime comparable to transporting beef
He’s lucky to be able to transport all of this. For other people, moving goods is a problem. Shipping ground coffee from the eastern part of the country is a crime comparable to transporting beef. You may not carry more than two kilograms of cheese because the authorities assume that that is the limit of household consumption. Although farmers are allowed to sell the milk produced by their cows, it is prohibited to sell cheese.
If they can’t sell, how would they survive? “In the East there is no money,” says a woman waiting to go to Jiguaní the next day. When she came to Havana the train broke down at 3:00 a.m. in Ciego de Avila and did not get underway until twenty-four hours later. The passengers, united by adversity, got off the train to talk and share water and food.
Despite a potential fine of 1,500 Cuban pesos, vendors selling bottles of ice water pass through the waiting room. There is no water on the train. Women carrying satchels offer sorbets, candies, and mints. The state-owned outlets offer sliced pork and rice with black beans in small cardboard boxes for 25 Cuban pesos, or hot dogs for only 10 pesos. The cheapest offering is bread and ham for 3 pesos. The ham is a slice slightly thinner than a razor blade and the bread is the color of white cement. Hunger helps one overlook the poor appearance of the food.
A cardboard box is the usual luggage of travelers. (14ymedio )
A wrinkled old woman is chewing hungrily. She lives in Dos Rios, where José Martí died , and she is the granddaughter of an Afro-Cuban soldier from the war of 1895. She came to Havana to spend a few days with a granddaughter and brought back a box of malangas because “you can’t get it there.” The bag that her belongings are in was once a sack for detergent. Her clothes look worn, but as clean as if they had been washed and dried in the sun.
Two women wearing the uniform of those employed by the “Safety and Security Agency” contemplate a sandwich wrapped in plastic without deciding whether to eat it. It is the snack given to them by the state, their employer. Most sell it to get 20 pesos. I ask them why the platform is barred and the gate controlled as if for barnyard animals. “They try to board the train without a ticket, that’s how to make sure people pay.”
Why don’t they want to pay? “There are those who travel with nothing but a bottle of water and 5 pesos. Aymami, this is very hard,” one answers. She doesn’t finish the sentence and laughs out loud as she walks away.
“In Havana, the fight is better than in the East,” everyone repeated
Those who sell and those who buy have a word in common: fight. “In Havana you fight.” “Here the fight is better than in the East,” everyone repeats. They come to the capital because they believe that the wages are higher. They do masonry, or work in agriculture with private producers, who pay fifty pesos a day (more than twice the average wage).
A young mother nurses her four-month-old baby. She carries a cargo of detergent, soap, toothpaste, and candies for kids. “The east is hard. Worse than Havana,” she says. She came from Guantanamo with a box of mangoes and guavas for her family in the capital: “There the fruit is sweeter and cheaper,” she says.
A woman wanders through selling plastic sandals. She explains that it is good business to buy in “La Cuevita” (a large unofficial market in the San Miguel del Padron municipality of Havana) and resell for a little more to travelers in the station. “We are all fighters, and this is the fight for survival,” she says, indicating the station with a sweeping gesture. “We’ll sell whatever is available, even caskets. Life is hard.”
The sandal-seller says that some regulars are homeless and spend the day at the station. They search in the dump for anything they can sell. “They go to La Coubre, the reservations and waiting-list terminal near the Central Station, to sleep on cardboard boxes they put on the ground. There they take advantage of and steal the suitcases from those unfortunate ones going back to the country,” she reveals.
The last train has left for Sancti Spiritus at 9:20 p.m. In front of the television in the waiting lounge men and women huddle who do not seem like travelers. They’re not waiting for anything. When the train has gone, the employees and a policeman prepare to close the terminal. They shoo them out: “Get up, we’re closing.”
Everyone obediently withdraws until the next day, at 6:30 a.m., when everything begins again.
Havana, Cuba – Because of the many lies and deceptions in Fidel Castro’s history, new generations of Cubans have great doubts about everything that happened since 1952.
Celia Sánchez was one of the key figures of the Revolution. She died in 1980. Her 21 years as personal secretary to Fidel Castro were devoted mainly to gathering “every last scrap of paper,” as she put it, in order to recover the history of that time, as it actually happened. On May 4, 1964, she founded the Office of Historical Affairs of the Council of State. They include, I suppose, the documents recording all the times that Fidel Castro swore up and down that he was not a communist.
A few days ago, on the 50th anniversary of the creation of that Office, Dr. EugenioSuárezPérez, its director, told thenewspaperGranmathatCelia‘s objective was tosafeguardthe historical memory ofthe Revolution, fromtheSierraMaestra to its eventual triumph, and that they had currently collectedmore than56,000background documents and more than159,000photographs. continue reading
If we could ask why Celia—“the advocate of the truth above all else” who“reviewed andclassifiedthe archives andprocessedthe textspersonally”—allowedtherepetition inthe national pressfor decades of theglaringandabsurdliethat 20thousand people had been martyredin the war againstBatista, a lie created in themagazineBohemia by Enriquitode la Osa, no one could answer,because they have never been able to produce a list of namesof those alleged martyrs.
This liehas been toldmore than oncewithinthe United NationsbyBrunoRodríguezParrilla,Ministerfor Foreign Affairs. OnMarch 3, 2010, hesaid:“The military dictatorshipsin Latin America,imposedand sustainedby the United Statesfor decades,have killed400,000people.InCuba alone they caused20,000deaths.” Andon October 26the following year,alsoat the UN: “Cubamadethe great changein 1959 at a cost of20 thousandlives, swept away by the dictatorship ofBatista, the henchmanof the United States.”
The “Heroineof the Sierra”also mutelyacceptedthat the amnestygrantedto the prisoners who had attacked the Moncada Barrackswas the result ofpressure fromthe masses, when she well knew thatthe masseshad remained outsidethe fray,and had not evenparticipated in the general strikesFidel had called for fromtheSierra. Journalistsin the employ of the regime and senior officials have lied about this.
EstebanLazo,President of the NationalAssembly of People’s Power, on the 45th anniversaryof thatinventedfeat, exclaimedbefore hundreds ofHavana residentsin the Vedado park at 23rd and 30th, that “it representedan extraordinary exampleof the people achieving victory.” AndCiroBianchi: “The peoplebacked the Batista dictatorship into a corner,because of their demand the bars of the cells were broken.”
Even todaythe national press,completely in the hands of the government, shamefully attempts to manipulatethe peoplewith political demagoguery,whichfew believe. They repeat like parrotsthat thepeople approvedthe hundreds offiring-squad executions, just because a fractionof thosemasses of people, taken by surpriseat a rally onJanuary 21, 1959, wasbedazzledin the face of the obsessive-compulsivepersonalityof the guerrilla leader.
For the same reason, Cubans todayare forcedto acceptsocialism, just because a bunchof overheatedmilitia, assembled by FidelCastro,cheered for himon the afternoon ofApril 15, 1961. That was the maximumleader’s style. He haddone the same thing with those men who, in the summer of1953, had no ideawhy they hadcome toSantiago deCuba, hours before the attackon the Moncada Barracks.
HAVANA, Cuba – Not that my neighbors would agree. It was purely coincidence. While the workers on the state payroll marched in the Plaza of the Revolution, my closest neighbors ran out of patience; they rebelled and demanded that I cut down my moringa tree.
It had been planted in November 2011, less than three years ago, when at the behest of Fidel Castro several trucks handed out saplings in polyethylene bags to the residents of Santa Fe, Cangrejera, Baracoa, Jaimanitas and the residential neighborhoods adjoining the Commander in Chief’s exclusive enclave, known as Ground Zero. continue reading
Along with the free saplings they also delivered a brochure printed for the occasion, explaining the properties of this plant, native to India, which according to the government is able to raise the dead and to nurture the living with protein, without the need of eating beefsteak, something the Commander forbade to us decades ago.
I got into the habit, I have to confess, of dropping its leaves into soup, for its spicy flavor and with the idea that it would infuse protein, as the Comandante recommended to us.
But the neighborhood refused to eat moringa. Pánfilo, a neighbor who repairs bicycle taxis, told me not to talk about it; what he wanted was a good steak. Pedro, the carpenter who had gone to prison for helping to kill a cow, said the same. Chicha and Sonia, their wives, would not even try the recommended infusion, and Angelito, the messenger, said that he was opposed to that nonsense. Even my neighbors the prosecutors, who in compliance with the “guidance from above” had dutifully planted one at the entrance to their condo, were never seen plucking a twig for the daily meal.
I can swear to you that I alone honored the moringa. Until yesterday, May 1st. As thousands of workers marched like migratory animals in front of the successor dictator of the Castro dynasty, some other workers, my neighbors, said that they were not going to put up with any more trash that blew off my moringa, invading walkways, patios, and kitchens. They were talking about the pods, seeds and leaves, which fell onto their food plates.
“Either you cut it down,” I heard them angrily say, “or we will.”
That’s how determined my neighbors were—Laima, a corporate accountant, Juan, a burglar-alarm technician, Yohanny a security guard, and several more.
I argued that it was a one of “Fidel’s trees” and they responded with outrage. They were also aggressive. I said that many had planted moringa in the patios of their homes and I hadn’t heard other protests and couldn’t understand their outrage. They all argued with me at the same time. And while they were doing so, I asked them why the hell they weren’t in the Plaza at the time, because it was May 1st.
Finally, at ten a.m. I gave up and, against my will, asked a friend to cut down the offending tree.
At dawn, when I looked out the window of my room, I saw its sawed off limbs. They seemed like dead skeletons. I couldn’t sleep, and battling insomnia I considered the exaggerated size that my little moringa had acquired, and especially the northerly wind gusts, which contributed to the daily defoliation and launched its thick, spiky seed pods left and right, at the head of anyone around
In addition I realized that, without being aware of it, perhaps because of a love for nature, I had become an accomplice in the last folly of the Maximum Leader of Cuba, when he sent a moringa to be planted at every house, because under his rule none of the workers who marched on May Day in the Plaza had the right to eat a steak, or to drink the glass of milk that his brother promised seven years ago.
Every summer since 2009, in line with the economic openings of General Castro, Gerald, the owner of a photography business, has rented a room in a hotel in Varadero for 5 nights.
Gerald, a white man married to a mixed-race woman, authoritatively calls attention to the small number of black or mixed-race Cuban tourists. “There are very few. I stay in four and five-star hotels and the blacks that I’ve seen are either employees, or partners of foreigners.” continue reading
“Last year I went to the hotel Memorie, which has a thousand rooms, and they had only 8 black or mixed-race guests, and half of them were the spouses or companions of foreigners,” said Orestes, a tall, well-dressed black man who manages a hard-currency cafeteria in Havana, and knows first-hand the disguised racism of the privileged economic sectors.
“For every black or mixed-race person who manages an important place there are 50 whites. In hotels or strategic positions in the economy, the managers are white. There the blacks are helpers, kitchen assistants, chamber maids, pool cleaners, or grass cutters. In the meetings of managers from over 400 Havana hard-currency cafes, nightclubs, and restaurants you see only about twenty in attendance who are darker skinned or black,” said Orestes.
Twice a week, Yamila and Melisa, a pair of lesbian prostitutes, come to a restaurant called Las Piedras, in Vedado, hunting for foreign tourists or Cubans with extra cash. “I can assure you that 70% of young prostitutes are mixed-race or black,” says Jamila.
Carlos, a sociologist, believes that racism in Cuba may not be the problem it is in the U.S. or Europe. “But there are strong prejudices and the social pyramid is designed so that very few blacks can succeed. Differences have remained since 1886 when slavery was abolished. Blacks are less fortunate. They live in the worst houses, receive fewer dollars or euros in remittances, and can’t vacation in first-rate tourist facilities. They remain marginalized. And that results in a large number of prostitutes and criminals in the prisons.”
Eleven years ago, in a speech to police officers and the Interior Ministry, Fidel Castro revealed that 80% of the prisoners in Cuba are blacks and mixed-race.
Joel, a black man who has spent 12 of his 34 years behind bars, believes that that reality has not changed. “In all prisons in Cuba—there are more than 200 prisons on the island according to human rights activists—the number of blacks far exceeds that of whites. Even the offenses are different. While most whites are in prison for killing cows, scams, financial crime or corruption, blacks tend to commit more violent crimes, such as fighting with knives, arson, theft, pickpocketing, assault, home invasion robbery, rape, and murder” says Joel, for whom prison is a second home.
A police investigator acknowledges that the usual pattern used by the police during operations is based on racial factors. “Young black men are more likely to be arrested. This modus operandi has not changed,” he says.
In 2013, Roberto Zurbano, the former director of the Publishing House of the Americas, was dismissed for acknowledging, in an interview with the New York Times, the significant differences between whites and blacks in Cuba.
According to the Census of Population and Housing completed in 2012, in one decade, based on the previous census of 2002, the mixed-race population in Cuba grew from 24.9 percent to 26.6 percent. The white population decreased from 65 percent to 64.1 percent, and blacks decreased from 10.1 percent to 9.3 percent.
The worst news for black and mixed-race Cubans is that there are no independent legal institutions that protect them in the face of government neglect.
Among the dissidents there is an anti-racist organization, CIR (Citizens for Racial Integration Committee) led by Juan Antonio Madrazo, which from an intellectual perspective studies and tries to give solutions to the current racial divides.
But the regime does not recognize them. Quite the contrary. It has accused black historian Manuel Cuesta Morúa, a CIR adviser, of promoting disorders “affecting international peace and security.” His freedom of movement is restricted by the state. He cannot travel abroad, and every Tuesday he has to report in at a police station.
Blacks and mixed-race members of the peaceful opposition often receive degrading treatment and racist abuse from counterintelligence officers.
According to the newspaper “Ahora,” Holguin authorities gathered at the Puerto Padre neighborhood to assess the urban revival project called “Identity and Development,” which is supposed to beautify the town for next July 26. As usual, applying rouge. continue reading
Local officials seem to be very excited; the people, not so much. The latter already know how these things work, and they say that the beneficiary, in quotes, is the same as always—the central Avenida Libertad—while the nearby streets will continue, forever and ever, without lighting, dirty, and full of potholes. The people call it “the Cuba wardrobe project: the ugly for Cubans, the pretty for foreigners.”
