MH
Posted on Fri, Jan. 02, 2009
Approval, discontent greet Castro revolution's 50th year in Cuba
By MIAMI HERALD STAFF
At Parque Dolores, tourist buses filled with Canadians and Europeans lugging cameras that cost two years' wages here listen to musical trios while elderly men pick through the trash.
The handicapped beg for coins under the mindful eye of a police officer. Aging newspaper hawkers trying to supplement their $9 monthly pensions sell copies of the government newspaper with the proud headline -- ``Keeps going down! Infant Mortality at 4.7!''
''Nothing in the world is better than this,'' said Raúl Ferrer, 86, a retired ship worker who spent Friday afternoon dozing on a bench.
''There is no other place that takes care of its elderly and children the way Cuba does. I quite honestly would be dead in my grave if it were not for this,'' Ferrer said, pointing to newspaper coverage of Thursday's celebration of the 50th anniversary of the revolution.
Some in Santiago and Havana who watched Raúl Castro's national address praised Fidel Castro for igniting the revolution that toppled a dictator, while others said the speech ignored the economic pain Cubans are feeling.
''He is saying nothing new,'' said Brenda, a Havana economist in her late 40s who kept making exasperated expressions as Castro spoke. ``He is saying nothing that all those people sitting there have not heard and know already.''
Others simply tuned out.
''I was not even interested in watching,'' said Regina, a housewife in her 40s. ``My husband kept calling me from the other room to go and watch it and I didn't.''
Conversations with Cubans in the eastern city of Santiago, the birthplace of the revolution, seem to mirror wider discussions -- some hushed -- about the revolution's future and legacy.
Ferrer's sister and brother-in-law were among insurgents who helped oust dictator Fulgencio Batista five decades ago. The years that followed saw a redistribution of wealth that caused the rich to flee and everyone else to become more or less poor.
''I used to be a big fan of the United States,'' Ferrer said. ''I loved it. But reading and reading, reading this,'' he said, pointing to the paper again, ``my eyes slowly started opening.''
He recounted spending 15 days in a Cuban hospital long ago and never paying a bill. Now, he is waiting for a slot in a home for the aged. In the meantime, Ferrer sleeps on a mat at a building he keeps an eye on at night.
''I am quite happy here,'' he said.
Not so for cab driver Andres. As he hoped to pick up some of the tourists near the square, he rolled his eyes hearing people talk of the 50th anniversary commemoration.
''I did not watch it,'' Andres said. 'I and most other Cuban people are tired of the lies. It's lies, lies and more lies. They get up there and talk to the Cuban people telling us, `You have to do this, you have to do that. You have to struggle.' I believe things I can see. You have to touch and feel reality. Nothing they said can be touched or felt. None of it was real.''
Francisco, 64, who sells peanuts to tourists in the plaza, praises the revolution.
''If the revolution had not won, who knows what shape this country would be in. My dad was a laborer for 20 cents a day, not a penny more,'' he said. ``Now look around. Every kid you see has a big belly and a scoop of ice cream in his hand.''
But he acknowledges a difficult life. He has to sell at least two dozen paper cones filled with nuts before he can afford a bar of soap and detergent to wash his guayabera.
''I watched the celebration of the anniversary last night on TV. It was very nicely decorated,'' he said, without a hint of irony in his voice.
A drummer singing Guantanamera to the tourists who refused to purchase peanuts proudly recounts how he was a fighter during the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion backed by the CIA and squelched by the Cuban government. He shakes his head at a belligerent elderly man who puts an old plastic ice cream cup in front of tourists' tables and won't leave until they drop in a coin.
''You have shameless people who don't want to struggle. Look at that old man, asking for money when he gets the same pension as me,'' said drummer Miguel Portuondo, 64, who goes by the stage name Bocú Yeyé. ``There are women at all the nightclubs in town batting their eyelashes sweetly, acting all innocent, when really they are pretending not to be prostitutes. Why? Because they do not want to work. They do not want to study.''
Portuondo did both. He joined the rebels at age 14, distributing underground propaganda in the city. 'I was only 14, but I was not the youngest! There were children as young as 12. Of course, I did not even know what I was struggling for, but my parents' hatred for Batista was so great that they had me distributing propaganda for the rebels.''
He later fought at the Bay of Pigs, although he did not know then what he was fighting against. On Thursday, he was one of the special invited guests at the historic celebration in Parque Cespedes. He was there as a former rebel fighter and renowned local musician. He keeps all his press clippings in his briefcase to prove it.
''For me, it was a very proud occasion,'' Portuondo said. ``These 50 years have been beautiful. Sure, we have to struggle, but this country gives you what you need to struggle -- an education. I studied, became a professional musician and retired. Now I am out here working and struggling to make a few extra dollars. There is nothing wrong with that.''
''The people who criticize this system or just want to leave have been co-opted by the desire for capitalism. But capitalism does not offer any love, affection or respect for the people,'' Portuondo said.
He said he proudly watched Castro's speech, calling it ``decisive.''
''He is a man who says things as they are: Two plus two equals four, not five,'' he said. ``That's how it is, and that's how he says it. He has a lot of virtues, just like his brother.''
The names of the correspondents who filed this report and the surnames of some of those interviewed were not published because the reporters lacked the journalist visa required by the Cuban government.
Friday, January 02, 2009
Sports still No. 1 in Cuba despite declines
MH
Posted on Fri, Jan. 02, 2009
Sports still No. 1 in Cuba despite declines
BY LINDA ROBERTSON
During Opening Ceremonies at the Beijing Olympics, former Cuban sports heroes Teofilo Stevenson, Javier Sotomayor and Ana Fidelia Quirot sat together inside Bird's Nest Stadium.
When the Cuban team marched onto the track, the three stars sprung to their feet and joined in the roar from the crowd, one of the loudest for any team in the parade of nations.
''I felt the excitement when the U.S. and Chinese teams marched in, but it was also electrifying to see this little island nation receive such respect and enthusiasm,'' said Jose Rodriguez, who sat with Stevenson, Sotomayor and Quirot. Rodriguez is executive director of USA Judo, a Miamian and a native of Cuba.
But the respect accorded Cuba wasn't matched by its performance in Beijing. Cuba had its worst Olympic showing in 40 years, winning only two gold medals and finishing 28th in the medal standings. Cuba is accustomed to being in the Top 10.
Cuba did not win a single gold in boxing. The baseball team lost the gold medal game to South Korea, and the women's volleyball team was upset by the United States.
The decline of Cuba as a sports power is a reflection of the dilapidated state of the island and the infirm Fidel Castro 50 years after his revolution. Sports continues to limp along despite the fading health of its No. 1 fan and shrinking budgets dating from the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Riddled by defections, Cuba has nonetheless remained competitive on the world stage. But its success rate, which was so disproportionate to its size during Castro's heyday, is no longer the strong morale-boosting propaganda tool that it was.
''The Beijing Olympics were an embarrassment for Cuba,'' said Roberto Quesada, a former trainer for the Cuban boxing team now coaching in Miami. ``That could mark the beginning of the end. I don't know if they can recover in these difficult economic times.''
The Games concluded with a humiliating incident for Cuba when tae kwon do athlete Angel Matos was disqualified during his match, kicked the referee in the face, spat on the mat and was banned from the sport.
Castro defended Matos, saying the match was fixed. He said boxers were ''condemned beforehand'' and cheated by judges.
In the same essay, Castro wrote that defections have hurt and blamed ''the repugnant mercenary actions'' of pro boxing promoters.
He promised a reassessment of ``every discipline, every human and material resource that we dedicate to sport.''
''Cuba has never bought an athlete or judge,'' Castro wrote, adding that Cubans need to brace themselves for the 2012 London Games. ``There will be European chauvinism, judge corruption, buying of brawn and brains and a strong dose of racism.''
Castro handed the presidency to brother Raúl in February but retains influence in deciding priorities. The few photos of Castro that are published give a clue to where the heart of the old sports nut still lies: He's wearing a red, white and blue Adidas track suit.
Castro was such a baseball aficionado he used to show up at practices and dictate the starting lineup. Successor Raúl may not be as obsessed, but Vice President Jose Ramon ''El Gallego'' Fernandez, a staunch friend of Fidel who defeated invaders at the Bay of Pigs, is head of Cuba's Olympic Committee, ensuring a pro-sports voice.
Alberto ''El Caballo'' Juantorena, track star of the 1976 Games, is senior vice president of INDER, the Cuban sports ministry. He is a charismatic figure, hugely popular.
Baseball still draws large crowds. The season started in early December and is on hiatus during celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the revolution. The season will also take a break during the World Baseball Classic in March, when Cuba's national team will go for the title three years after finishing second.
As for Cuba's newly formatted two-division league, there is lots of talk about pitcher Yulieski Gonzalez, 15-0 last year, sluggers Alexei Bell and Donald Duarte and rookie Yasel Puig. German Mesa is the new manager of Industriales, and Victor Mesa is out as manager of Villa Clara. Can Pedro Lazo extend his career victories total toward 250?
There are also wistful whispers about the ones who got away, such as Alexei ''the Cuban Missile'' Ramirez, who defected and signed with the Chicago White Sox. He was runner-up for Rookie of the Year. Up and coming Dayan Viciedo defected to Miami and was signed by the White Sox last month.
Since pitcher Rene Arocha defected in Miami in 1991, about 100 baseball players have fled Cuba. Their exodus shows that, in some ways, Castro's Big Red Machine has been a victim of its own success.
Before Castro took over, Cuban baseball players joined U.S. teams. In the 1950s, the Havana Sugar Kings were a Triple A International League franchise. Cuba was also home to boxing stars.
But Castro outlawed ''corrupt and exploitative'' professional sports in 1961 and created the national sports program, which was modeled on the Soviet system. Voluntary sports councils (CDVs) were set up in towns along with a pyramid of sports schools (EIDEs, ESPAs and CEARs) to identify and develop talent. Castro's goal was to win international legitimacy and domestic pride.
He promoted masividad -- mass participation -- to enhance the health of workers. He eliminated country clubs and admission charges. Sport became ''a right of the people'' delineated in the constitution.
A breakthrough came in 1966, when Cuban athletes -- forbidden by the U.S. to travel by plane -- came to San Juan, Puerto Rico, by boat and won 78 medals at the Central American and Caribbean Games. At the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, Cuba finished fifth in the medal count.
It's been downhill since. In 1991, Cuba lost its Soviet subsidies and began the Special Period of scarcity.
Cuba has found new sources of income by renting out coaches and trainers, allowing athletes to sign endorsement contracts overseas and selling equipment. Athletes remain amateur; experts get paid. For example, Cuban computer technicians ran some operations during the Central American and Caribbean Games in Cartagena, Colombia.
''Can Cuban sports be saved by capitalism?'' author Paula Pettavino asked. ``That remains to be seen.''
Rising sports salaries, the influence of the Internet, the success of a few Cuban athletes and deteriorating conditions at home have spurred defections. Fewer athletes espouse the patriotism of track star Quirot, who dedicated medals to her commandante en jefe or boxer Felix Savon, who proclaimed he preferred the hearts of 10 million countrymen to the riches of 10 million dollars.
All Cubans know the remarkable story of Orlando ''El Duque'' Hernandez, the pitcher who left by boat, got stranded on Anguilla Cay, signed for millions with none other than the New York Yanquis, then played in the World Series nine months later. His agent was Miami's Joe Cubas, once known for his Cuban pipeline.
Seven members of the Under-23 soccer team fled from a Tampa hotel in March. Two players left the national team when it played the United States in Washington, D.C., two months ago.
When the Cuban judo team competed in Miami in May, two-time world champion Yurisel Laborde defected.
In 2006, three 2004 Olympic boxing champions sold their medals, then left a training camp in Venezuela. Another champ was kicked off the team after trying to defect in 2007. And a world champion left Cuba by speedboat in May. They signed pro contracts with a German promoter.
Yet Cuba still produces athletes other nations envy.
''We've never seen in the U.S. the talent level Cuba has had since 1962,'' said Milton Jamail, international player relations consultant for the Tampa Bay Rays and a former University of Texas professor who wrote Full Count: Inside Cuban Baseball. ``They produce too many players to have a 30-man team and contain them. Some need to leave or they would never replenish.
``I think it's amazing for all the travel they do that they don't have more defections. There will always be that tension, and they know they cannot avoid some losses.''
When Viciedo held a tryout in the Dominican Republic, 100 Major League scouts showed up to watch him.
''Baseball is still great -- it's recovered from a slump in the mid 1990s -- and the Cuban people still adore it,'' Jamail said.
Rodriguez took the U.S. judo team to tournaments in Havana in May. It was his 14th trip to Cuba since 1985. The Americans weren't treated as lavishly as in the past, when they were feted at the Tropicana.
''The government used to spend a lot of money, but now they have to focus every penny on their athletes, who also don't live as well as they used to,'' Rodriguez said. ``They are really struggling, but still compete at a higher level than most countries.''
Rodriguez said his athletes came home impressed by Cuban athletes' workouts on the beach, in which they used the water and sand to invent grueling drills.
''Cubans may not have the material things, but they have the desire,'' he said. ``I don't see the gloom and doom or agree with the theory that Beijing marked the end for Cuban sports. The infrastructure is still there, the expertise is still there and, most importantly, the talent is still there.''
Rodriguez coaxed the Cuban judo team to Miami after decades of ill will. The team got an enthusiastic reception. Two U.S. coaches who used to be stars for Cuba even went out on the town with their former comrades.
What does the future hold? There is hope that with two new presidents -- Barack Obama and Raúl Castro -- relations could warm. Maybe they'll even use some form of ''ping-pong diplomacy'' -- a series of games or training camps in the U.S. and on the island.
''I foresee coaching exchanges, the Pan Am Games in Miami and U.S. vs. Cuba in baseball,'' Rodriguez said.
Eventually, might Cuba allow select athletes to sign pro contracts here?
Quesada says no. ''Raúl will never cross that line,'' he said. ``There will be no pros fighting for money as long as any Castro is in power.''
Jamail foresees Major League teams opening academies on the island, as 29 teams have in the Dominican Republic and 10 in Venezuela.
He would also like to see all of Cuba's stars -- inside and outside Cuba -- representing the country in the World Baseball Classic or the Olympics, if baseball is reinstated to the Olympics.
''I always feel silly talking about what's going to happen in Cuba because, who knows?'' Jamail said. ``Who could predict Fidel would still be around 50 years later?''
Posted on Fri, Jan. 02, 2009
Sports still No. 1 in Cuba despite declines
BY LINDA ROBERTSON
During Opening Ceremonies at the Beijing Olympics, former Cuban sports heroes Teofilo Stevenson, Javier Sotomayor and Ana Fidelia Quirot sat together inside Bird's Nest Stadium.
When the Cuban team marched onto the track, the three stars sprung to their feet and joined in the roar from the crowd, one of the loudest for any team in the parade of nations.
''I felt the excitement when the U.S. and Chinese teams marched in, but it was also electrifying to see this little island nation receive such respect and enthusiasm,'' said Jose Rodriguez, who sat with Stevenson, Sotomayor and Quirot. Rodriguez is executive director of USA Judo, a Miamian and a native of Cuba.
But the respect accorded Cuba wasn't matched by its performance in Beijing. Cuba had its worst Olympic showing in 40 years, winning only two gold medals and finishing 28th in the medal standings. Cuba is accustomed to being in the Top 10.
Cuba did not win a single gold in boxing. The baseball team lost the gold medal game to South Korea, and the women's volleyball team was upset by the United States.
The decline of Cuba as a sports power is a reflection of the dilapidated state of the island and the infirm Fidel Castro 50 years after his revolution. Sports continues to limp along despite the fading health of its No. 1 fan and shrinking budgets dating from the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Riddled by defections, Cuba has nonetheless remained competitive on the world stage. But its success rate, which was so disproportionate to its size during Castro's heyday, is no longer the strong morale-boosting propaganda tool that it was.
''The Beijing Olympics were an embarrassment for Cuba,'' said Roberto Quesada, a former trainer for the Cuban boxing team now coaching in Miami. ``That could mark the beginning of the end. I don't know if they can recover in these difficult economic times.''
The Games concluded with a humiliating incident for Cuba when tae kwon do athlete Angel Matos was disqualified during his match, kicked the referee in the face, spat on the mat and was banned from the sport.
Castro defended Matos, saying the match was fixed. He said boxers were ''condemned beforehand'' and cheated by judges.
In the same essay, Castro wrote that defections have hurt and blamed ''the repugnant mercenary actions'' of pro boxing promoters.
He promised a reassessment of ``every discipline, every human and material resource that we dedicate to sport.''
''Cuba has never bought an athlete or judge,'' Castro wrote, adding that Cubans need to brace themselves for the 2012 London Games. ``There will be European chauvinism, judge corruption, buying of brawn and brains and a strong dose of racism.''
Castro handed the presidency to brother Raúl in February but retains influence in deciding priorities. The few photos of Castro that are published give a clue to where the heart of the old sports nut still lies: He's wearing a red, white and blue Adidas track suit.
Castro was such a baseball aficionado he used to show up at practices and dictate the starting lineup. Successor Raúl may not be as obsessed, but Vice President Jose Ramon ''El Gallego'' Fernandez, a staunch friend of Fidel who defeated invaders at the Bay of Pigs, is head of Cuba's Olympic Committee, ensuring a pro-sports voice.
Alberto ''El Caballo'' Juantorena, track star of the 1976 Games, is senior vice president of INDER, the Cuban sports ministry. He is a charismatic figure, hugely popular.
Baseball still draws large crowds. The season started in early December and is on hiatus during celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the revolution. The season will also take a break during the World Baseball Classic in March, when Cuba's national team will go for the title three years after finishing second.
As for Cuba's newly formatted two-division league, there is lots of talk about pitcher Yulieski Gonzalez, 15-0 last year, sluggers Alexei Bell and Donald Duarte and rookie Yasel Puig. German Mesa is the new manager of Industriales, and Victor Mesa is out as manager of Villa Clara. Can Pedro Lazo extend his career victories total toward 250?
There are also wistful whispers about the ones who got away, such as Alexei ''the Cuban Missile'' Ramirez, who defected and signed with the Chicago White Sox. He was runner-up for Rookie of the Year. Up and coming Dayan Viciedo defected to Miami and was signed by the White Sox last month.
Since pitcher Rene Arocha defected in Miami in 1991, about 100 baseball players have fled Cuba. Their exodus shows that, in some ways, Castro's Big Red Machine has been a victim of its own success.
Before Castro took over, Cuban baseball players joined U.S. teams. In the 1950s, the Havana Sugar Kings were a Triple A International League franchise. Cuba was also home to boxing stars.
But Castro outlawed ''corrupt and exploitative'' professional sports in 1961 and created the national sports program, which was modeled on the Soviet system. Voluntary sports councils (CDVs) were set up in towns along with a pyramid of sports schools (EIDEs, ESPAs and CEARs) to identify and develop talent. Castro's goal was to win international legitimacy and domestic pride.
He promoted masividad -- mass participation -- to enhance the health of workers. He eliminated country clubs and admission charges. Sport became ''a right of the people'' delineated in the constitution.
A breakthrough came in 1966, when Cuban athletes -- forbidden by the U.S. to travel by plane -- came to San Juan, Puerto Rico, by boat and won 78 medals at the Central American and Caribbean Games. At the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, Cuba finished fifth in the medal count.
It's been downhill since. In 1991, Cuba lost its Soviet subsidies and began the Special Period of scarcity.
Cuba has found new sources of income by renting out coaches and trainers, allowing athletes to sign endorsement contracts overseas and selling equipment. Athletes remain amateur; experts get paid. For example, Cuban computer technicians ran some operations during the Central American and Caribbean Games in Cartagena, Colombia.
''Can Cuban sports be saved by capitalism?'' author Paula Pettavino asked. ``That remains to be seen.''
Rising sports salaries, the influence of the Internet, the success of a few Cuban athletes and deteriorating conditions at home have spurred defections. Fewer athletes espouse the patriotism of track star Quirot, who dedicated medals to her commandante en jefe or boxer Felix Savon, who proclaimed he preferred the hearts of 10 million countrymen to the riches of 10 million dollars.
All Cubans know the remarkable story of Orlando ''El Duque'' Hernandez, the pitcher who left by boat, got stranded on Anguilla Cay, signed for millions with none other than the New York Yanquis, then played in the World Series nine months later. His agent was Miami's Joe Cubas, once known for his Cuban pipeline.
Seven members of the Under-23 soccer team fled from a Tampa hotel in March. Two players left the national team when it played the United States in Washington, D.C., two months ago.
When the Cuban judo team competed in Miami in May, two-time world champion Yurisel Laborde defected.
In 2006, three 2004 Olympic boxing champions sold their medals, then left a training camp in Venezuela. Another champ was kicked off the team after trying to defect in 2007. And a world champion left Cuba by speedboat in May. They signed pro contracts with a German promoter.
Yet Cuba still produces athletes other nations envy.
''We've never seen in the U.S. the talent level Cuba has had since 1962,'' said Milton Jamail, international player relations consultant for the Tampa Bay Rays and a former University of Texas professor who wrote Full Count: Inside Cuban Baseball. ``They produce too many players to have a 30-man team and contain them. Some need to leave or they would never replenish.
``I think it's amazing for all the travel they do that they don't have more defections. There will always be that tension, and they know they cannot avoid some losses.''
When Viciedo held a tryout in the Dominican Republic, 100 Major League scouts showed up to watch him.
''Baseball is still great -- it's recovered from a slump in the mid 1990s -- and the Cuban people still adore it,'' Jamail said.
Rodriguez took the U.S. judo team to tournaments in Havana in May. It was his 14th trip to Cuba since 1985. The Americans weren't treated as lavishly as in the past, when they were feted at the Tropicana.
''The government used to spend a lot of money, but now they have to focus every penny on their athletes, who also don't live as well as they used to,'' Rodriguez said. ``They are really struggling, but still compete at a higher level than most countries.''
Rodriguez said his athletes came home impressed by Cuban athletes' workouts on the beach, in which they used the water and sand to invent grueling drills.
''Cubans may not have the material things, but they have the desire,'' he said. ``I don't see the gloom and doom or agree with the theory that Beijing marked the end for Cuban sports. The infrastructure is still there, the expertise is still there and, most importantly, the talent is still there.''
Rodriguez coaxed the Cuban judo team to Miami after decades of ill will. The team got an enthusiastic reception. Two U.S. coaches who used to be stars for Cuba even went out on the town with their former comrades.
What does the future hold? There is hope that with two new presidents -- Barack Obama and Raúl Castro -- relations could warm. Maybe they'll even use some form of ''ping-pong diplomacy'' -- a series of games or training camps in the U.S. and on the island.
''I foresee coaching exchanges, the Pan Am Games in Miami and U.S. vs. Cuba in baseball,'' Rodriguez said.
Eventually, might Cuba allow select athletes to sign pro contracts here?
Quesada says no. ''Raúl will never cross that line,'' he said. ``There will be no pros fighting for money as long as any Castro is in power.''
Jamail foresees Major League teams opening academies on the island, as 29 teams have in the Dominican Republic and 10 in Venezuela.
He would also like to see all of Cuba's stars -- inside and outside Cuba -- representing the country in the World Baseball Classic or the Olympics, if baseball is reinstated to the Olympics.
''I always feel silly talking about what's going to happen in Cuba because, who knows?'' Jamail said. ``Who could predict Fidel would still be around 50 years later?''
Thursday, January 01, 2009
In Cuba, a whiff of rugged individualism (Revolution at 50)
AP
In Cuba, a whiff of rugged individualism
Country sees changes, generation gap 50 years after Castro swept to power
The Associated Press
updated 2:43 p.m. PT, Thurs., Jan. 1, 2009
Juan Gonzalez loves Fidel Castro. But he is also a realist.
"The people do what they can. They don't just sit around and wait for the government to give them everything," the 59-year-old said, standing on his dusty front porch. "If they waited for the government to keep all its promises, they would have to wait a long time. Fifty more years, maybe."
It sounds like the kind of rugged individualism that would resonate with Americans, but this is the mountainous Sierra Maestra of eastern Cuba, the cradle of the revolution that brought Castro to power 50 years ago New Year's Day, ushering in a communist era of promised egalitarianism under big, all-controlling government.
Here, more than 500 miles from Havana, people tend to speak their minds more freely, even grumble openly about their privations.
They also see a growing generation gap — between elder Cubans who wholeheartedly support the communist system, and youngsters yearning for change, at a time when the ailing, 82-year-old Castro has been replaced by his younger brother, Raul, and Barack Obama is about to move into the White House.
The Sierra Maestra is where Castro and his guerrillas prevailed over 10,000 soldiers sent in by dictator Fulgencio Batista in May 1958 and eventually forced Batista to flee Cuba on Jan. 1 of the following year.
'La revolucion'
Gonzalez, from the village of Santo Domingo, was 9 when the rebellion Cubans universally call "la revolucion" triumphed.
Now, as the revolution turns 50, how does he feel about it? "The people here feel good, but not everyone has the same amount of pride," he said.
That's because the promises of a shining future have not come as fast as they may have hoped. Electricity, running water and phone service are relatively new here. Some families still live in dirt-floored shacks and wash their clothes in rivers. Carts pulled by oxen, donkeys or horses outnumber cars and trucks.
Gonzalez is charged with the upkeep of his grandfather's homestead, now a historical site. The biggest problem, he says, is a lack of public transport. The area had a single ambulance but a few years ago "it broke and some people died because of that."
Soviet engineers only brought electricity to the area in 1986.
South of Santo Domingo lies Comandancia de la Plata, the hideout where Fidel Castro directed the final rebel push. He lived in a wooden hut with a roof of palm leaves. Outside, still encrusted with bullet fragments, is the tree on which he practiced his marksmanship.
'Should be more autonomy'
Luis Angel Segura, 55, is a guide who leads tourists up a muddy mule trail to the hut. Spend a few hours with him, and long-held complaints begin to bubble to the surface. What makes him angry is not too little government but too much — farmers can only grow what the state tells them to, and only sell their produce back to the government.
"There should be more autonomy," he said. "But, as they tell us, 'we're all Cuba."'
Still, no one here misses Batista. Like many Cubans in these parts, Segura calls the pre-Castro era "the tyranny."
About 600 people live in the isolated mountains around Comandancia de la Plata. Solar panels power tiny schoolhouses and health clinics. In the farthest regions, teachers live with pupils' families and doctors make house calls. Like nearly all Cubans, people here live rent-free and get monthly rations of basic food.
The government expanded a two-lane mountain highway through the area, but there's so little traffic that farmers dry their coffee beans on the asphalt. Goats, pigs, donkeys and dogs sleep on it undisturbed.
Many families have TVs bought with government credit, but few channels reach deep into the mountains. To fill the void there are "video clubs," shacks that show pirated movies. Internet access is tightly controlled.
As in the cities, rural areas have "Committees for the Defense of the Revolution" which meet to discuss community problems. Public attendance is mandatory.
"Everything here is well organized," said Julia Castillo, a housewife in the Sierra Cristal, another eastern mountain range that was a rebel stronghold. "But people complain and nothing happens."
'Education is a gigantic weapon'
Ask Cubans to rate their education and medical care systems, and many will talk instead about Batista's day — though few are old enough to have experienced it. An exception is Ruben La O.
"Before the revolution, I couldn't read," said the 73-year-old, who fought in Castro's rebel army. "Education is a gigantic weapon. Most people don't understand that, but Fidel does."
La O was 23 and from a reasonably well-to-do family of coffee farmers when the rebels recruited him as lead singer for a quintet that performed on Radio Rebelde, a propaganda station that Ernesto "Che" Guevara founded in the Sierra Maestra in 1958.
The musicians still don olive-green rebel uniforms and play songs denouncing Batista for tourists. They live in a row of concrete houses Castro ordered built for them in 1981, and, to honor the 50th anniversary of the revolution, each has been given a new mo-ped.
"In capitalism there are no schools. Socialism has solidarity, education, health and societal development that capitalism can't fathom," said Alejandro Molina, the quintet's 69-year-old founder and guitarist.
But La O's brother Alcides, a fellow quintet member, said the lesson is lost on many younger Cubans.
"There are lots of schools and lots of people who don't want to study," he said. "They don't take advantage of all they have."
Alejandro, a farm worker who lives nearby, says the problem is not apathy but a lack of freedom.
"Solidarity? Fine. But it is no substitute for political change," said the 26-year-old, who lives with his parents and didn't want to cause them problems by giving his surname. "People are ready for new things. There's a lot of frustration."
In Cuba, a whiff of rugged individualism
Country sees changes, generation gap 50 years after Castro swept to power
The Associated Press
updated 2:43 p.m. PT, Thurs., Jan. 1, 2009
Juan Gonzalez loves Fidel Castro. But he is also a realist.
"The people do what they can. They don't just sit around and wait for the government to give them everything," the 59-year-old said, standing on his dusty front porch. "If they waited for the government to keep all its promises, they would have to wait a long time. Fifty more years, maybe."
It sounds like the kind of rugged individualism that would resonate with Americans, but this is the mountainous Sierra Maestra of eastern Cuba, the cradle of the revolution that brought Castro to power 50 years ago New Year's Day, ushering in a communist era of promised egalitarianism under big, all-controlling government.
Here, more than 500 miles from Havana, people tend to speak their minds more freely, even grumble openly about their privations.
They also see a growing generation gap — between elder Cubans who wholeheartedly support the communist system, and youngsters yearning for change, at a time when the ailing, 82-year-old Castro has been replaced by his younger brother, Raul, and Barack Obama is about to move into the White House.
The Sierra Maestra is where Castro and his guerrillas prevailed over 10,000 soldiers sent in by dictator Fulgencio Batista in May 1958 and eventually forced Batista to flee Cuba on Jan. 1 of the following year.
'La revolucion'
Gonzalez, from the village of Santo Domingo, was 9 when the rebellion Cubans universally call "la revolucion" triumphed.
Now, as the revolution turns 50, how does he feel about it? "The people here feel good, but not everyone has the same amount of pride," he said.
That's because the promises of a shining future have not come as fast as they may have hoped. Electricity, running water and phone service are relatively new here. Some families still live in dirt-floored shacks and wash their clothes in rivers. Carts pulled by oxen, donkeys or horses outnumber cars and trucks.
Gonzalez is charged with the upkeep of his grandfather's homestead, now a historical site. The biggest problem, he says, is a lack of public transport. The area had a single ambulance but a few years ago "it broke and some people died because of that."
Soviet engineers only brought electricity to the area in 1986.
South of Santo Domingo lies Comandancia de la Plata, the hideout where Fidel Castro directed the final rebel push. He lived in a wooden hut with a roof of palm leaves. Outside, still encrusted with bullet fragments, is the tree on which he practiced his marksmanship.
'Should be more autonomy'
Luis Angel Segura, 55, is a guide who leads tourists up a muddy mule trail to the hut. Spend a few hours with him, and long-held complaints begin to bubble to the surface. What makes him angry is not too little government but too much — farmers can only grow what the state tells them to, and only sell their produce back to the government.
"There should be more autonomy," he said. "But, as they tell us, 'we're all Cuba."'
Still, no one here misses Batista. Like many Cubans in these parts, Segura calls the pre-Castro era "the tyranny."
About 600 people live in the isolated mountains around Comandancia de la Plata. Solar panels power tiny schoolhouses and health clinics. In the farthest regions, teachers live with pupils' families and doctors make house calls. Like nearly all Cubans, people here live rent-free and get monthly rations of basic food.
The government expanded a two-lane mountain highway through the area, but there's so little traffic that farmers dry their coffee beans on the asphalt. Goats, pigs, donkeys and dogs sleep on it undisturbed.
Many families have TVs bought with government credit, but few channels reach deep into the mountains. To fill the void there are "video clubs," shacks that show pirated movies. Internet access is tightly controlled.
As in the cities, rural areas have "Committees for the Defense of the Revolution" which meet to discuss community problems. Public attendance is mandatory.
"Everything here is well organized," said Julia Castillo, a housewife in the Sierra Cristal, another eastern mountain range that was a rebel stronghold. "But people complain and nothing happens."
'Education is a gigantic weapon'
Ask Cubans to rate their education and medical care systems, and many will talk instead about Batista's day — though few are old enough to have experienced it. An exception is Ruben La O.
"Before the revolution, I couldn't read," said the 73-year-old, who fought in Castro's rebel army. "Education is a gigantic weapon. Most people don't understand that, but Fidel does."
La O was 23 and from a reasonably well-to-do family of coffee farmers when the rebels recruited him as lead singer for a quintet that performed on Radio Rebelde, a propaganda station that Ernesto "Che" Guevara founded in the Sierra Maestra in 1958.
The musicians still don olive-green rebel uniforms and play songs denouncing Batista for tourists. They live in a row of concrete houses Castro ordered built for them in 1981, and, to honor the 50th anniversary of the revolution, each has been given a new mo-ped.
"In capitalism there are no schools. Socialism has solidarity, education, health and societal development that capitalism can't fathom," said Alejandro Molina, the quintet's 69-year-old founder and guitarist.
But La O's brother Alcides, a fellow quintet member, said the lesson is lost on many younger Cubans.
"There are lots of schools and lots of people who don't want to study," he said. "They don't take advantage of all they have."
Alejandro, a farm worker who lives nearby, says the problem is not apathy but a lack of freedom.
"Solidarity? Fine. But it is no substitute for political change," said the 26-year-old, who lives with his parents and didn't want to cause them problems by giving his surname. "People are ready for new things. There's a lot of frustration."
Sunday, December 07, 2008
Cuba says blogger ran afoul of the law (Generacion Y)
AP
Cuba says blogger ran afoul of the law
By WILL WEISSERT, Associated Press Writer Will Weissert, Associated Press Writer Fri Dec 5, 4:40 pm ET
HAVANA – Police have prohibited Cuba's most prominent blogger from attending an independent cyber-workshop and warned that her activities ran afoul of the law, her husband said Friday.
Yoani Sanchez and husband and fellow blogger Reynaldo Escobar were summoned separately Wednesday to a police station near their apartment in Havana's Vedado district and reprimanded, Escobar said in a telephone interview.
Authorities told the couple they could not travel to the western province of Pinar del Rio for a two-day blogger's workshop scheduled to begin Friday night.
"We aren't attending the inauguration of the workshop, which has not been suspended. We've just changed the dynamic of how we are meeting," said Escobar, without elaborating.
An account of the reprimand appears on Sanchez's blog, "Generacion Y." The site was blocked to Internet users on the island Friday.
Sanchez wrote that police told her, "We want to warn you that you have transgressed all the limits of tolerance with your closeness and contact with elements of the counterrevolution."
Sanchez could not be reached Friday, and Cuba's government had no comment.
Another Havana blogger, Claudia Cadelo, was also called into a meeting with police, but failed to appear because she is in the hospital, Escobar said.
The gathering was supposed to involve about 20 bloggers and is being organized by Dagoberto Valdes, a Roman Catholic layman in Pinar del Rio. Valdes was the volunteer director of the church magazine Vitral, which gently called for more plurality and democratic participation, until he was removed from the post by the island's bishop in April 2007.
Valdes was traveling Friday, but his associate, Virgilio Toledo, said authorities in Pinar del Rio also advised two local activists against attending the workshop.
"They think it's an activity about human rights, which it's not," Toledo said.
The Communications Ministry put into effect a law this week that instructs the island's Internet providers to "prevent access to sites where the content is contrary to social interests, morals or good custom, as well as the use of applications that affect the integrity or security of the State."
Escobar said the police suggested Cuba was especially sensitive to criticism as it struggles to recover from the effects of three storms that hit in less than two months this hurricane season, causing more than $10 billion in damage.
Asked if Cuba could be in the midst of a cyber-crackdown, he said, "I don't know how far they will go."
"For dissidents who traditionally have been surrounded, things have gotten stricter," Escobar said, referring to a small group of activists who dare criticize the island's single-party system.
Cuba tolerates no organized political opposition and dismisses dissidents and activists as "mercenaries" who take money from the United States to undermine the communist system.
Sanchez's posts about the struggles of daily life on the island have made her a sensation overseas and she won Spain's Ortega y Gasset Prize for digital journalism.
According to her blog, police said that her activities had "totally nullified your ability to dialogue with Cuban authorities."
Access to the Internet is strictly controlled in Cuba and the government routinely blocks sites it considers too critical.
Cuba says blogger ran afoul of the law
By WILL WEISSERT, Associated Press Writer Will Weissert, Associated Press Writer Fri Dec 5, 4:40 pm ET
HAVANA – Police have prohibited Cuba's most prominent blogger from attending an independent cyber-workshop and warned that her activities ran afoul of the law, her husband said Friday.
Yoani Sanchez and husband and fellow blogger Reynaldo Escobar were summoned separately Wednesday to a police station near their apartment in Havana's Vedado district and reprimanded, Escobar said in a telephone interview.
Authorities told the couple they could not travel to the western province of Pinar del Rio for a two-day blogger's workshop scheduled to begin Friday night.
"We aren't attending the inauguration of the workshop, which has not been suspended. We've just changed the dynamic of how we are meeting," said Escobar, without elaborating.
An account of the reprimand appears on Sanchez's blog, "Generacion Y." The site was blocked to Internet users on the island Friday.
Sanchez wrote that police told her, "We want to warn you that you have transgressed all the limits of tolerance with your closeness and contact with elements of the counterrevolution."
Sanchez could not be reached Friday, and Cuba's government had no comment.
Another Havana blogger, Claudia Cadelo, was also called into a meeting with police, but failed to appear because she is in the hospital, Escobar said.
The gathering was supposed to involve about 20 bloggers and is being organized by Dagoberto Valdes, a Roman Catholic layman in Pinar del Rio. Valdes was the volunteer director of the church magazine Vitral, which gently called for more plurality and democratic participation, until he was removed from the post by the island's bishop in April 2007.
Valdes was traveling Friday, but his associate, Virgilio Toledo, said authorities in Pinar del Rio also advised two local activists against attending the workshop.
"They think it's an activity about human rights, which it's not," Toledo said.
The Communications Ministry put into effect a law this week that instructs the island's Internet providers to "prevent access to sites where the content is contrary to social interests, morals or good custom, as well as the use of applications that affect the integrity or security of the State."
Escobar said the police suggested Cuba was especially sensitive to criticism as it struggles to recover from the effects of three storms that hit in less than two months this hurricane season, causing more than $10 billion in damage.
Asked if Cuba could be in the midst of a cyber-crackdown, he said, "I don't know how far they will go."
"For dissidents who traditionally have been surrounded, things have gotten stricter," Escobar said, referring to a small group of activists who dare criticize the island's single-party system.
Cuba tolerates no organized political opposition and dismisses dissidents and activists as "mercenaries" who take money from the United States to undermine the communist system.
Sanchez's posts about the struggles of daily life on the island have made her a sensation overseas and she won Spain's Ortega y Gasset Prize for digital journalism.
According to her blog, police said that her activities had "totally nullified your ability to dialogue with Cuban authorities."
Access to the Internet is strictly controlled in Cuba and the government routinely blocks sites it considers too critical.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Fidel Gets Religion: Why on earth did Castro build a Russian Orthodox cathedral in Havana?
SLATE
fighting words
Fidel Gets Religion
Why on earth did Castro build a Russian Orthodox cathedral in Havana?
By Christopher Hitchens
Posted Monday, Nov. 17, 2008, at 11:56 AM ET
In January of 2009—on New Year's Day, to be precise—it will have been half a century since the brave and bearded ones entered Havana and chased Fulgencio Batista and his cronies (carrying much of the Cuban treasury with them) off the island. Now the chief of the bearded ones is a doddering and trembling figure, who one assumes can only be hanging on in order to be physically present for the 50th birthday of his "revolution." It's of some interest to notice that one of the ways in which he whiles away the time is the self-indulgence of religion, most especially the improbable religion of Russian Orthodoxy.
Ever since the upheaval in his own intestines that eventually forced him to cede power to his not-much-younger brother, Raúl, Fidel Castro has been seeking (and easily enough finding) an audience for his views in the Cuban press. Indeed, now that he can no longer mount the podium and deliver an off-the-cuff and uninterruptable six-hour speech, there are two state-run newspapers that don't have to compete for the right to carry his regular column. Pick up a copy of the Communist Party's daily Granma (once described by radical Argentine journalist Jacobo Timerman as "a degradation of the act of reading") or of the Communist youth paper Juventud Rebelde (Rebel Youth), and in either organ you can read the moribund musings of the maximum leader.
These pieces normally consist of standard diatribes about this and that, but occasionally something is said that sparks interest among a resigned readership. Such an instance occurred on my visit to the island last month. Castro decided to publish a paean to Russian Orthodoxy, to devote a state subsidy to it, and to receive one of its envoys. I quote from the column, headed "Reflections by Comrade Fidel" and titled "The Russian Orthodox Church," which was "syndicated," if that's the word, on Oct. 21. This church, wrote Castro:
[i]s a spiritual force. It played a major role at critical times in the history of Russia. At the onset of the Great Russian War, after the treacherous Nazi attack, Stalin turned to her for support to the workers and peasants that the October Revolution had changed into the owners of factories and the land.
These sentences contain some points of real interest. It is certainly true, for example, that the Orthodox Church "played a major role at critical times in the history of Russia." It provided the clerical guarantee of serfdom and czarism, for example, and its demented anti-Semitism gave rise to the fabrication of the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which had a ghastly effect well beyond the frontiers of Russia itself. That's partly why the Bolsheviks sought to break the church's power and why the church replied in kind by supporting the bloodthirsty White Russian counterrevolution. But Castro openly prefers Stalin to Lenin, which may be why he refers to the Nazi assault on the USSR as "treacherous." He is quite right to do so, of course, but it does involve the awkward admission that Stalin and Hitler were linked by a formal military alliance against democracy until 1941 and that Stalin was more loyal to the pact than the "treacherous" Hitler was. And, yes, of course the Orthodox Church backed Stalin, just as he always subsidized the Orthodox Church. But these are chapters of shame in the history of Russia and even in the history of communism and Christianity. Why would Castro single out the darkest moments for his praise?
It gets worse. As Castro writes in the same column, concerning the visit of a Russian Orthodox archbishop named Vladimir Gundjaev to Cuba, "I suggested building a Cathedral of the Russian Orthodox Church in the capital of Cuba as a monument to Cuban-Russian friendship. … During the construction, earth was brought from the place where the remains were laid to rest of the Soviet soldiers who perished in our country during the tens of years they rendered services here." How extraordinary! He writes as if the Soviet (or, interchangeably, Russian) soldiers had fallen in combat in Cuba, and as if the Soviet Communist regime had sanctified their deaths—of old age or venereal disease or suicide, since there never was any war—as a sort of Christian martyrdom.
I have been in Cuba many times in the past decades, but this was the first visit where I heard party members say openly that they couldn't even guess what the old buzzard was thinking. At one lunch involving figures from the ministry of culture, I heard a woman say: "What kind of way is this to waste money? We build a cathedral for a religion to which no Cuban belongs?" As if to prove that she was not being sectarian, she added without looking over her shoulder: "A friend of mine asked me this morning: 'What next? A subsidy for the Amish?' "
All these are good questions, but I believe they have an easy answer. Fidel Castro has devoted the last 50 years to two causes: first, his own enshrinement as an immortal icon, and second, the unbending allegiance of Cuba to the Moscow line. Now, black-cowled Orthodox "metropolitans" line up to shake his hand, and the Putin-Medvedev regime brandishes its missile threats against the young Obama as Nikita Khrushchev once did against the young Kennedy. The ideology of Moscow doesn't much matter as long as it is anti-American, and the Russian Orthodox Church has been Putin's most devoted and reliable ally in his re-creation of an old-style Russian imperialism. If you want to see how far things have gone, take a look at the photograph of President Dmitry Medvedev's inauguration, as he kisses the holy icon held by the clerical chief. Putin and Medvedev have made it clear that they want to reinstate Cuba's role in the hemisphere, if only as a bore and nuisance for as long as its military dictatorship can be made to last. Castro's apparent deathbed conversion to a religion with no Cuban adherents is the seal on this gruesome pact. How very appropriate.
Christopher Hitchens is a columnist for Vanity Fair and the Roger S. Mertz media fellow at the Hoover Institution in Stanford, Calif.
Article URL: http://www.slate.com/id/2204820/
fighting words
Fidel Gets Religion
Why on earth did Castro build a Russian Orthodox cathedral in Havana?
By Christopher Hitchens
Posted Monday, Nov. 17, 2008, at 11:56 AM ET
In January of 2009—on New Year's Day, to be precise—it will have been half a century since the brave and bearded ones entered Havana and chased Fulgencio Batista and his cronies (carrying much of the Cuban treasury with them) off the island. Now the chief of the bearded ones is a doddering and trembling figure, who one assumes can only be hanging on in order to be physically present for the 50th birthday of his "revolution." It's of some interest to notice that one of the ways in which he whiles away the time is the self-indulgence of religion, most especially the improbable religion of Russian Orthodoxy.
Ever since the upheaval in his own intestines that eventually forced him to cede power to his not-much-younger brother, Raúl, Fidel Castro has been seeking (and easily enough finding) an audience for his views in the Cuban press. Indeed, now that he can no longer mount the podium and deliver an off-the-cuff and uninterruptable six-hour speech, there are two state-run newspapers that don't have to compete for the right to carry his regular column. Pick up a copy of the Communist Party's daily Granma (once described by radical Argentine journalist Jacobo Timerman as "a degradation of the act of reading") or of the Communist youth paper Juventud Rebelde (Rebel Youth), and in either organ you can read the moribund musings of the maximum leader.
These pieces normally consist of standard diatribes about this and that, but occasionally something is said that sparks interest among a resigned readership. Such an instance occurred on my visit to the island last month. Castro decided to publish a paean to Russian Orthodoxy, to devote a state subsidy to it, and to receive one of its envoys. I quote from the column, headed "Reflections by Comrade Fidel" and titled "The Russian Orthodox Church," which was "syndicated," if that's the word, on Oct. 21. This church, wrote Castro:
[i]s a spiritual force. It played a major role at critical times in the history of Russia. At the onset of the Great Russian War, after the treacherous Nazi attack, Stalin turned to her for support to the workers and peasants that the October Revolution had changed into the owners of factories and the land.
These sentences contain some points of real interest. It is certainly true, for example, that the Orthodox Church "played a major role at critical times in the history of Russia." It provided the clerical guarantee of serfdom and czarism, for example, and its demented anti-Semitism gave rise to the fabrication of the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which had a ghastly effect well beyond the frontiers of Russia itself. That's partly why the Bolsheviks sought to break the church's power and why the church replied in kind by supporting the bloodthirsty White Russian counterrevolution. But Castro openly prefers Stalin to Lenin, which may be why he refers to the Nazi assault on the USSR as "treacherous." He is quite right to do so, of course, but it does involve the awkward admission that Stalin and Hitler were linked by a formal military alliance against democracy until 1941 and that Stalin was more loyal to the pact than the "treacherous" Hitler was. And, yes, of course the Orthodox Church backed Stalin, just as he always subsidized the Orthodox Church. But these are chapters of shame in the history of Russia and even in the history of communism and Christianity. Why would Castro single out the darkest moments for his praise?
It gets worse. As Castro writes in the same column, concerning the visit of a Russian Orthodox archbishop named Vladimir Gundjaev to Cuba, "I suggested building a Cathedral of the Russian Orthodox Church in the capital of Cuba as a monument to Cuban-Russian friendship. … During the construction, earth was brought from the place where the remains were laid to rest of the Soviet soldiers who perished in our country during the tens of years they rendered services here." How extraordinary! He writes as if the Soviet (or, interchangeably, Russian) soldiers had fallen in combat in Cuba, and as if the Soviet Communist regime had sanctified their deaths—of old age or venereal disease or suicide, since there never was any war—as a sort of Christian martyrdom.
I have been in Cuba many times in the past decades, but this was the first visit where I heard party members say openly that they couldn't even guess what the old buzzard was thinking. At one lunch involving figures from the ministry of culture, I heard a woman say: "What kind of way is this to waste money? We build a cathedral for a religion to which no Cuban belongs?" As if to prove that she was not being sectarian, she added without looking over her shoulder: "A friend of mine asked me this morning: 'What next? A subsidy for the Amish?' "
All these are good questions, but I believe they have an easy answer. Fidel Castro has devoted the last 50 years to two causes: first, his own enshrinement as an immortal icon, and second, the unbending allegiance of Cuba to the Moscow line. Now, black-cowled Orthodox "metropolitans" line up to shake his hand, and the Putin-Medvedev regime brandishes its missile threats against the young Obama as Nikita Khrushchev once did against the young Kennedy. The ideology of Moscow doesn't much matter as long as it is anti-American, and the Russian Orthodox Church has been Putin's most devoted and reliable ally in his re-creation of an old-style Russian imperialism. If you want to see how far things have gone, take a look at the photograph of President Dmitry Medvedev's inauguration, as he kisses the holy icon held by the clerical chief. Putin and Medvedev have made it clear that they want to reinstate Cuba's role in the hemisphere, if only as a bore and nuisance for as long as its military dictatorship can be made to last. Castro's apparent deathbed conversion to a religion with no Cuban adherents is the seal on this gruesome pact. How very appropriate.
Christopher Hitchens is a columnist for Vanity Fair and the Roger S. Mertz media fellow at the Hoover Institution in Stanford, Calif.
Article URL: http://www.slate.com/id/2204820/
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Cuba replaces foreign investment minister Lomas
AP
Cuba replaces foreign investment minister Lomas
Wed Nov 12, 10:08 pm ET
HAVANA – Cuba replaced its foreign investment minister Wednesday in a high-profile Cabinet change, but did not explain the move.
A statement read during the communist island's nightly newscast said the Communist Party's Politburo "decided to liberate" Marta Lomas from the position. It did not give a reason, and it was not clear if she will take on a new governmental role.
She will be replaced by former U.N. Ambassador Rodrigo Malmierca, whom the statement praised as an experienced diplomat and leader.
The 24-member Politburo is headed by Fidel Castro, 82 years old and ailing, who stepped down from the presidency in February in favor of his younger brother Raul.
Havana's communist government controls well over 90 percent of the economy, but the island created joint business ventures with foreign enterprises and began encouraging foreign tourism en masse in the early 1990s after the collapse of the Soviet Union crippled its economy.
As foreign investment minister, Lomas helped negotiate contracts with trade delegations from foreign governments and foreign business leaders.
Cuba replaces foreign investment minister Lomas
Wed Nov 12, 10:08 pm ET
HAVANA – Cuba replaced its foreign investment minister Wednesday in a high-profile Cabinet change, but did not explain the move.
A statement read during the communist island's nightly newscast said the Communist Party's Politburo "decided to liberate" Marta Lomas from the position. It did not give a reason, and it was not clear if she will take on a new governmental role.
She will be replaced by former U.N. Ambassador Rodrigo Malmierca, whom the statement praised as an experienced diplomat and leader.
The 24-member Politburo is headed by Fidel Castro, 82 years old and ailing, who stepped down from the presidency in February in favor of his younger brother Raul.
Havana's communist government controls well over 90 percent of the economy, but the island created joint business ventures with foreign enterprises and began encouraging foreign tourism en masse in the early 1990s after the collapse of the Soviet Union crippled its economy.
As foreign investment minister, Lomas helped negotiate contracts with trade delegations from foreign governments and foreign business leaders.
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