Havana Times: The First Anniversary

By Circles Robinson

HAVANA TIMES, Oct. 15 — One year ago I was on vacation in Matagalpa, Nicaragua, sitting in a friend’s apartment during the second week of October editing the diary posts and features that would be the first materials to appear in Havana Times. In Spain, our Cuban webmaster was also putting the finishing touches on the initial design.

The idea to start the site actually began years back at my former Havana translating job, where several of us felt the need to take some initiative to get out some better writing from Cuba in English. We believed this would give a broader look at the different realities and complexities of the country, hitting on both its accomplishments and challenges.

We wanted to get away from the hell presented by the foreign mainstream press and the heaven described by the Cuban media.

We first considered a small-format print publication to be made available at hotels on the island, but starting a new publication without institutional support—plus the economic difficulties and bureaucratic controls—made that proposition appear next to impossible. A few years later, frustration finally pushed us to give it a try, but online.

Taking part in several critical discussions between Cuban journalists about the press in their country convinced me that it was time for action. I hoped I would have some supporters and was well aware there would be detractors.

Running a site from inside Cuba is a no easy matter due to the slow dial-up phone Internet connection, if you have one. I had that privilege through my job and as a member of the Cuban Journalists Association (UPEC). For those fond of the figures, the connection in Cuba is between 16 and 50 kbs, depending on where you are and the state of the phone lines.

Other countries had a similar situation one to two decades ago, but most now have much-improved technology. Cuba has lagged behind, officially due to the US blockade, but some believe a lack of desire to offer widespread Internet use is another key factor.

The vast majority of the people writing on the site are Cubans who do not have Internet access, and many could only see the site and their published materials when they dropped by my apartment. Some have e-mail, which facilitates sending in their writing, but not Internet.

No Permission, Work Place Blues

Contrary to what some might think, I didn’t ask anyone for permission to put out HT, and have never had anyone from the Communist Party or the government directly telling me what I should or shouldn’t publish.

Nonetheless, when one of our writers was summarily fired from his job as a professor, one of the reasons given was his writing in Havana Times. A student was close to being expelled for the same reason.

I also had problems at my work place, which I was dependent on for my residency in Cuba.

My boss had been an early advocate of taking initiative with an alternative publication and even collaborated briefly at the beginning of HT. However, once things got off the ground, he threatened me several times, implying that by having started Havana Times without permission from the center’s director —which I never would have received— I should turn a blind eye to his unprofessional behavior at work.

Ultimately, the ugly office scene went from bad to worse, involving my refusal to go along with the nepotism, corruption and poor management practices of my boss, which led to my yearly contract not being renewed, although I was never told why. Having been a “vanguard worker” of the center didn’t even entitle me to a meeting to hear my accusers, much less defend myself.

The ex-boss is one of those “cadres” we’ve talked about previously in HT who are causing so much damage to the Cuban Revolution. Their abuses of power discourage others — especially young people— to take an active part.

They stifle initiative from the rank-and-file while parroting “revolutionary discourse” to impress their higher ups, but gear their efforts to defending personal privileges and perks…kind of like the overly severe preacher who has a dark personal life that needs hiding.

Increased Readership, Now Spanish Too

As Havana Times celebrates its first anniversary, we continue an unabated rise in readership as and I am editing the materials from Nicaragua, where I have lived since my Cuban residency ran out in June.

The Cubans who make up this publication have remained quite committed, some increasing their writing frequency considerably. E-mail, be it their own or a friend or colleagues, continues to make it possible for the writers to get their materials to me for publishing.

For the last couple months we have been receiving between two and three thousand hits a day. Now that we just began putting out a Spanish version, readership has immediately increased another ten to fifteen percent. Reader comments are also up considerably.

I sincerely hope that Havana Times has filled a space for you and has contributed to a better understanding of a highly unique country with the potential to show humanity that “a better world is possible.”

Cleaning House in Cuba

By Circles Robinson

HAVANA TIMES, August 10 — The Cuban government’s answer to the rampant theft and corruption problem plaguing the socialist economy is a new comptroller’s office, something that exists in many countries.

The lax administrative and accounting controls present in much of the country’s state-run economy are no secret to anyone, much less to the nation’s leaders.

With a major drive taking place to improve work efficiency and productivity and to cut imports at a time of international economic crisis, confronting a problem that has permeated all strata of Cuban society is an urgent but equally difficult task.

President Raul Castro sounded the alarm when he took office in February 2008, when he made it known that tolerance of misuse of state resources was on the out. Since then, little guys scraping to get by, on up to several of the country’s top ministers and political figures in much larger illicit operations, have fallen from grace after being accused of theft or corruption.

The president has made battling such un-revolutionary behavior a priority, while also recognizing that low salaries and a lack of incentives for greater initiative have affected job motivation and efficiency.

Trusting more in the businesses run by the military, Castro has put several former Army administrators in key positions in the civilian state economy.

Nonetheless, neither the military nor the civilian economy is held accountable to the public as neither the workers nor the general population are privy to the economic performance information that would make possible an educated evaluation of efficiency.

Instead, Cubans are accustomed to being told to blindly trust the judgment of their leaders and the administrators they in turn appoint to manage public resources.

The other catch-all factor has been the ever present “enemy to the north” with its blockade and other attempts to strangle the island’s economy, which serve corrupt officials as a shield.

The New Watch Dog

This weekend Two months ago the government announced that the Comptroller’s Office — conceived as a watch dog over the use of state funds and resources — would be a place where citizens can file complaints on such abuses and expect to get action. The office is headed by legislator Gladys Maria Brejerano Portela, just appointed a week earlier ago.

Created by the legislature, the office will receive and follow up on complaints filed by citizens on the misuse of public resources and other illegalities and acts of corruption, said Jose Luis Toledo Santander, president of the parliament’s Constitutional and Juridical Affairs Committee.

Virtually every Cuban, foreign resident or visitor is in one way or another regularly taken in by the different income-supplement scams that have grown to become as normal as rice and beans for most people, whether they like it or not.

In everyday life, very few people even bother to complain about being overcharged or getting taken on the weight or quality of a product. Instead, they often show understanding or even sympathy toward whoever is doing the taking to make a sorely needed buck.

At the same time, many people speculate privately that for so much theft to take place so rampantly on the ground level, there have to be accomplices higher up — from supervisors to managers, to executives, on up to ministers.

Will people now take advantage of the opportunity to file a complaint that supposedly could bring some action? Or will they continue to avoid picking a fight with a boss or higher up that in the past has often had the cards stacked in their favor.

Some Airline Bomb Plotters Go to Jail

By Circles Robinson

HAVANA TIMES, Sept. 14 — Three men accused of plotting to blow up several planes in the UK were sentenced to long prison terms on Monday. Meanwhile, across the Atlantic in Miami, two men who bragged about bombing a passenger plane that killed 72 persons are free to continue conspiring to commit more terrorist acts.

Assad Sarwar, Abdulla Ahmed Ali and Tanvir Hussain were sentenced to 36, 40 and 32 years in prison for the plot they were unable to carry out to blow up seven transatlantic flights from London, reported The Guardian.

The plot was defused on August 10, 2006 and led to restrictions on the carrying of liquids on many flights around the globe.

Meanwhile, Cuban-exiles Orlando Bosch and Luis Posada Carriles continue free in Miami despite ample documentation of their having orchestrated the 1976 bombing of a Cuban passenger plane that killed all 72 persons on board off the coast of Barbados.

Declassified files and other evidence point to the reason Bosch and Posada are free is that they worked clandestinely for the US government when “their” bombing took place.

Despite being classified as dangerous terrorists by the FBI, numerous US administrations have protected them under a “good terrorist” policy.

Cuba’s Dual Purpose Newspapers

By Circles Robinson

HAVANA TIMES, August 14 — Every few months toilet paper becomes scarce in the Cuban capital, where people are accustomed to cutting up old newspapers to fill the gap. This deficit can last for weeks, until the centralized importation mechanism manages to make another purchase and the inflexible distribution chain supplies it to the stores.

Several news publications, starting with USA Today, have run stories on the current shortage. (http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2009/08/deep-doodoo-cuba-short-of-toilet-paper.html)

When toilet paper finally appears again, lines will form at shopping centers and other stores for consumers to stock up. Everybody knows the routine.

Why does this problem recur at least a few times a year?

While such information is not made known to the public, I believe it symbolizes the gaps between producers or importers, distributors, retailers and the bureaucrats signing the checks —virtually all State-owned companies and institutions.

The rigid specialization of each aspect of getting the product on store shelves means that if any rung in the ladder fails or somebody miscalculates, the public suffers the consequences, since the other rungs are not empowered to act on their own.

Likewise, when making purchases on such a large scale it’s easy to make a mistake on the quantities or the distribution. Since purchase plans often appear to be overly strict, any error is paid for by 11.2 million Cubans. If anyone takes the time to complain they can expect the US blockade to inevitably be the catch-all excuse for the situation.

And while Cuba’s newspapers do the job when the TP is out, they too are scarce and don’t come close to meeting the demand.

USA Today noted Friday that Cuba imports TP and produces its own, but doesn’t have the raw materials to make it at this moment. The government is short on cash, notes the newspaper, adding that during the current global economic crisis Cuba is spending more for imports and receiving less for its exports.

Cristina Fernandez on Honduras Coup

By Circles Robinson

The June 28 military coup in Honduras has captivated a lot of people’s attention around the globe and especially in Latin America, and there’s plenty of reason why.

It wasn’t that long ago when many of the continent’s nations were ruled by ruthless leaders whose power stemmed from similar actions.

The 9/11/73 coup in Chile is one of the many that remains fresh in my mind as if it happened yesterday: Images too vivid to forget; too many lessons to be learned. The one most present was surely repeated in Honduras last Sunday.

A friend was on a train traveling from Chile to Argentina on Sept. 11, 1973, when she passed by a car where a group of businessmen were opening numerous bottles of champagne. They were so delighted that my friend couldn’t help but to knock on their door and ask what they were celebrating.

After hearing that President Salvador Allende was dead and his government overthrown, she was filled with terror. And it wasn’t for nothing; her children, husband and dreams were back in Chile and totally vulnerable to the reign of terror that would follow.

Late Saturday night July 4, and on into Sunday morning, the Organization of American States (OAS) held a special meeting to work out a common approach to the critical situation in Honduras.

Foreign ministers from most of the 34-member countries were present as well as the presidents of Argentina, Paraguay and Honduras: Cristina Fernandez Kirchner, Fernando Lugo and Manuel Zelaya.

I watched the entire session broadcast live on Telesur TV. By far the speech that caught my attention the most came from Cristina Fernandez Kirchner.

Today, I received the transcription thanks to the permanent OAS mission of Argentina. Wanting to share it with Havana Times readers we quickly went to work translating it.

To read the speech by Argentine President Cristina Fernandez Kirchner at the OAS click on: http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=11319

Honduras Showdown on July 4 Weekend

By Circles Robinson

HAVANA TIMES, July 4 — The Honduran military and its civilian face that staged a coup last Sunday told the OAS Secretary General Manuel Insulza on Friday they have no intention of giving up power in the impoverished Central American country.

A state of siege —that here includes a curfew, strict media censorship and general deterioration of the human rights situation— is par for the course during such events. The Cuban media is giving around the clock coverage of the crisis.

The cold reception to Insulza and his call for turning back the clock a week, sets the stage for a larger conflict on Sunday July 5, if Insulza, joined by presidents Cristina Kirchner (Argentina) and Rafael Correa (Ecuador), accompany Zelaya back to Honduras as planned.

The military-civilian government says it will arrest Zelaya and charge him with 18 violations of the law.

The de-facto leaders’ reaction to Insulza reminds one of the Carter years (1977-1980) when cruel dictatorships controlled a good portion of Latin America and the Georgia peanut farmer campaigned publicly for respect for human rights.

Knowing full well that the US under Nixon and Ford and previous presidents had supported the violent takeovers and killings of center and leftwing opposition that followed, rulers like Pinochet in Chile, Videla, Viola and Galtieri in Argentina, Alfredo Stroessner in Paraguay and Somoza in Nicaragua, etc., gave the Carter rhetoric the thumbs down.

They rightly gambled that Washington was not going to take any concrete action that would reverse the coups and open the door to leftwing electoral victories. Kennedy had promised there would be no more Cuba’s in Latin America and that doctrine still prevailed.

If Micheletti and the Honduran military hold firm in the face of possible severe economic sanctions and diplomatic isolation, the ball will be in the court of the OAS, the UN and other regional bodies like the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA) to up the ante or let the coup succeed by default.

As for the Obama administration —which like Carter in his time, has so far offered only rhetoric against the coup— the million dollar question is whether there are any teeth in Barack’s bite?

Cuba Needs Initiative but…

by Circles Robinson

HAVANA TIMES — Like the seemingly never ending US blockade that attacks Cuba’s economy from without, from the inside a corrosion process is gradually eating away at the relatively young 50-year revolution.

Nonetheless, taking initiative to stop the rust is much easier said than done.

Top Cuban leaders have noted repeatedly that to meet the challenges facing the nation, the country is in dire need of greater productivity, better quality services, and more efficient use of resources to reduce imports.

All these things require new ideas, methods and creativity. At the same time there is a conservative political class of managers at most workplaces and government offices who fear and resist any attempts to change the status quo. Anybody who has lived and worked in Cuba knows what I am talking about.

This group of “cuadros” (cadres), known for their political loyalty to their superiors, exist to guarantee the hierarchical top-down command structure, taken on decades ago in the face of the very real US treat.

While it might not have been the initial intention, their function often serves to stifle participation with the result being that many workers in socialist Cuba feel little different from their disempowered counterparts under capitalism.

Several factors influence the resistance to change from the bosses that consider themselves loyal lieutenants of the Revolution, including suspicion of new ideas as well as a defense of petty (but cherished) privileges and perks, and managerial authority.

A manager’s control over material resources, or access to them, in a country with great shortages can also be a big plus if that person’s ethics run adrift. And this has become so commonplace in today’s Cuba that chains of abuse of power and theft have become the norm instead of the exception, a reality President Raul Castro has pledged to fight.

The role of the media

I believe the media plays an important role in making visible these serious problems affecting the Cuban Revolution.

When we started Havana Times our aim was to put into practice a call made by the Cuban Journalists Association (UPEC) at its VIII Congress last July to leave behind the self-censorship that has characterized the local press.

But taking initiative that could stimulate controversy is also risky in the media, although not in the sense of Mexico, Guatemala, Columbia and many other countries. In Cuba no journalist has been murdered since Ecuadorian reporter Carlos Bastidas Arguello in 1958, the year before the Cuban Revolution.

However, the drive to write about everyday life and problems in Cuba, and their possible causes, can quickly prove damaging to a writer or editor’s career. The fact is that managers in the Cuban media also want to avoid rocking the boat.

Ask young reporters working for the local media what happens when they take initiative to write about thorny or controversial issues in a more than superficial way.

One statistic illustrates the answer: While in countries like the United States, reporters and other newspaper workers have been laid off by the thousands during the current economic crisis, in tiny Cuba there are currently several hundred journalist jobs nationwide waiting to be filled.

Aside from the country’s aging population, one of the main reasons for the vacancies is that the profession, and how it is practiced, has little attraction to young Cubans. The media is seen as an ultra-rigid, monotonous, highly controlled field.

But a lack of workplace motivation is not only present in the media; it runs throughout many sectors of society. Many people agree that the biggest factor is the low salaries, but one could add that the opportunity for taking greater initiative could be a way to improve morale. People might then feel like active participants on the job, rather than alienated and indifferent, while waiting to be told what to do.

Hillary Tough on Cuba Spies

by Circles Robinson

When you have spent a half century trying to overthrow a neighboring country’s government, assassinate its leaders and officials, and umpteen other types of sabotage, it should be no surprise that somebody’s conscious might go astray from the norm.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed outrage this week about the former government employee Walter Kendal Myers, 72 and his wife Gwendolyn Myers 71, having passed on classified information to the Cuban government, which they reportedly admired.

Clinton did not say whether the Myers put in jeopardy terrorist actions planned against Cuba by Miami exiles with US government support, a practice that has been steadfast policy practically since Fidel Castro rode into Havana in 1959.

"I have directed our security personnel to review every possible security program we have, every form of vetting and clearance that we employ in the State Department, to determine what more we can do to guard against this kind of outrageous violation," Clinton told reporters at a news conference in Indonesia, reported Reuters.

Myers and his wife were arrested and charged with conspiracy to act as illegal agents of the Cuban government and conspiracy to communicate classified information to Havana. A hearing on Wednesday will determine whether the retired couple —who pleaded not guilty— will remain in prison until their trial.

The Myers, who live in northwest Washington D.C. face a possible 35-year sentence that would all but assure their death in prison.

The Obama administration is the 11th consecutive US government to maintain an economic blockade on Cuba and continues to forbid its citizens from traveling to the Caribbean island nation without special Treasury Dept. permission.

Bills are currently in committees in both US House of Representatives and the Senate to relax portions of the blockade and eliminate the travel ban. President Obama has not supported nor said whether he would sign such bills if they reach his desk.

On Tuesday, the Jamaica Business Observer quoted Daniel Erikson of the Inter-American Dialogue and Sarah Stephens for Centre for Democracy in the Americas as saying at a conference in Kingston that at least the travel ban on US citizens wanting to visit Cuba may be lifted “by September or October.”

At the same time Stephens said “It will be very tough to get to that final ending of the embargo (called a blockade in Cuba) anytime soon. But I think that the lifting of the travel ban is real.”

Numerous business and travel related groups lobbying Congress to end the travel ban believe that an influx of US visitors to Cuba will eventually pressure the Obama administration to restore normal diplomatic and trade relations with the neighboring island.

For more on Cuba check out www.havanatimes.org

Obama’s Stand on Cuba

by Circles Robinson

This month’s upcoming Americas Summit is a perfect chance to see inside the crystal ball of future US-Latin American relations.

With the US election campaign long over, and President Obama to reach his first 90 days in office while at the April 17-19 meeting in Trinidad and Tobago, the time to act is now, not later.

While there is no indication of much policy change in the more complicated near east, except for a slight shift in focus from Iraq to the occupation of Afghanistan, Latin America is the one place where numerous analysts are saying Obama is offered a low-hanging fruit ripe for the picking.

The analogy refers to rapprochement with Cuba and an about-face from a half-century policy of hostility towards the Caribbean neighbor. Doing so would please most Americans, US business people and Cubans and upset few people outside of the hardcore Miami exile crowd.

A CNN survey taken on April 3 found that 71 percent of those polled said that the U.S. should reestablish diplomatic relations with Cuba, while only 27 percent opposed such a move.

However, that low-hanging fruit—written up in US newspaper editorials as a win-win situation for both countries, and a move that would do a lot to improve the poor US image throughout the continent—is not going to be there forever.

Ripe fruit either is picked or eventually drops and rots. It takes a full year for such a delicious opportunity to present itself again and if a storm in the wrong season occurs, it could take two years for a similar fruit to appear.

Out of Touch Ambassador

Obama’s advisor, Ambassador Jeffrey Davidow, who heads the administration’s prep team for Trinidad and Tobago, has shown the same disrespect for the region that has earned the US such a bad name.

Davidow accused Cuba of being the only undemocratic nation in the hemisphere, the “odd man out,” and thus should not be part of the Summit or its agenda. He speaks as if these are the former times when the US was capable of pressuring the hemisphere to accept its dictates.

"I think it would be unfortunate, actually, to lose the opportunity for this hemisphere - at the beginning of the Obama administration - to set down some guidelines and make some progress jointly by getting distracted by the Cuban issue," Davidow said at a conference on Thursday.

Such an attitude is provoking a whirlwind of meetings and discussions between the different Latin American leaders that could lead to pressing Obama to show his real commitment to change in the US relationship with the region.

Obama already got a dose of friendly advice from Brazil’s Lula da Silva at the White House in March. Lula, who some say may be playing a behind the scenes mediation role, has publicly advised Obama to engage with Cuba and end the blockade.

The same message of the need to open dialogue was brought home by seven US Representatives, led by Barbara Lee (D-CA), who just go back from five days in Havana meeting with top Cuban authorities including President Raul Castro and former President Fidel Castro.

Ambassador Davidow is forgetting that while Cuba was indeed isolated 50 years ago, when the embargo was imposed, it’s now the US that is practically alone in the hemisphere and the world on its Cuba policy.

Just last November, 185 countries voted in the United Nations in favor of a Cuban resolution demanding the US end its blockade. Only two countries joined the US in opposing: Israel and Palau, a tiny former US colony.

The Blockade not the Travel Ban is the Big Issue

My friends in the US, who supported Obama, hope he is working behind the scenes towards dialogue with Cuba and change in US policy. Privileging Cuban-Americans to visit their families or even allowing US citizens to visit Cuba is not the biggest issue for Cuba or Latin America. After all, that is just punishment on US citizens by their government.

What the region’s leaders are demanding is an end to the economic blockade that has hampered Cuba’s development and caused much suffering.

Somehow, Cuba has still managed to provide an incredible amount of medical, educational and sports training assistance to dozens of countries abroad, in a rare policy of “sharing the little it has and not just leftovers or extras.”

The Americas Summit should provide a better picture of what “change” really means and what is just campaign rhetoric. I, like many of my friends in the US, am hoping for the best.

Is Cuba in Her Universe?

By Circles Robinson

Miss Universe, Dayana Mendoza, is back home from the US Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and she says she “had a wonderful time” visiting several days with the soldiers as part of the U.S.O. Armed Forces Entertainment Tour.

Occupied territories and prison camps must be a lot of fun when you don’t have to meet the people whose land was taken or the inmates who have faced years of abuse and mistreatment.

One of the highlights according to Dayana’s blog: http://www.missuniverse.com/missuniverse/blog.php was the military dogs who gave her “a very nice demonstration of their skills.”

Something tells me her visit with the cute dogs was a little different than the canine-human encounters inside the Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp, established in 2002.

However, don’t get me wrong, Mendoza who traveled with Miss USA Crystle Stewart, did get a glimpse of the prisoner conditions: “We visited the detainee camps and we saw the jails, where they shower, how the recreate themselves with movies, classes of art, books. It was very interesting,” said Mendoza.

After Miss Universe got a big welcoming lunch it was off to “one of the bars they have here on the base.” There, Dayana and Crystle heard first hand from the soldiers about life on Gitmo.

“We had a wonderful time, this truly was a memorable trip! We hung out with the guys from the East Coast [of the base] and they showed us the boat inside and out, how they work and what they do… it was a loooot of fun!”

One of the highlights for Miss Universe was: “We took a ride with the Marines around the land to see the division of Gitmo and Cuba while they informed us with a little bit of history.” She didn’t elaborate on the content of the lessons.

The US military has held Guantanamo Bay since 1903 on what Cuba considers a totally illegitimate perpetual lease.

“I didn’t want to leave, it was such a relaxing place, so calm and beautiful,” said Mendoza who grew up in Venezuela but has lived in the US as a model for several years.

Miss Universe did not express any interest in visiting the part of Cuba governed by the Cubans. Perhaps because that part of the Caribbean island nation doesn’t participate in the contest that made her famous, or could it be that Cuba and Dayana are not really in the same universe?