South Africa: Cuban Bailout – Minister Davies Must Account to Parliament
South Africa: Cuban Bailout – Minister Davies Must Account to Parliament6 February 2012
press release
The South African government has wasted R600 million on sustaining the failed Cuban state, including what government has called a "solidarity grant". This follows a R1.4 billion Cuban bailout that President Zuma authorised in December 2010.
When the Parliamentary session reconvenes, the Democratic Alliance (DA) will request that the Minister of Trade and Industry, Rob Davies, appear before Parliament to explain what economic objectives are achieved by this decision.
We want to know how this cash injection for Cuba will help the millions of South Africans who live below the breadline.
Cuba has a tiny economy and little to offer South Africa by way of trade. Our trade with Cuba is unlikely to ever exceed R100 million per year. And at the same time, we have our own massive domestic problems in housing, energy, infrastructure, unemployment and a host of other areas.
It is difficult to justify giving the Cuban regime R2 billion in handouts when our own people are suffering daily.
The R600 million Minister Davies handed out on Friday consisted of credit write-offs, new credit lines and some cash payments. It also includes a R100 million "solidarity grant", which will not need to be paid back to South Africa.
The Cuban regime has a long track record of failing to pay back our loans. In 2010, South Africa had to write off R1.1 billion in bad Cuban debt, and on Friday we wrote off another R250 million in bad debt.
It is a tragic irony that a portion of the Cuban handout is earmarked to promote food security in Cuba, when our own food security is under threat here at home.
We have recently been forced to import maize at a very high price, affecting millions of South Africans who rely on maize-based products as staple food.
The time has come for South Africa to invest in strategic partnerships that deliver prosperity for our people. Maintaining symbolic friendships at enormous costs do not help the South African people.
Geordin Hill Lewis, Shadow Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry
University Reform Without Autonomy / Dimas Castellano
University Reform Without Autonomy / Dimas CastellanoDimas Castellanos, Translator: Unstated
On the 50th anniversary of the University Reform enacted in January 1962, the newspaper Granma published on Monday, January 9, 2012, an article entitled University and Society by Armando Hart Dávalos, in which he proposes that "after the triumph of the Revolution university reform was essential to realizing the final link between the university and the people and the new national socio-economic reality … "
In the article he omits the most significant: the history that led to the loss of University Autonomy as the nerve center of civil society. This simplification of the antecedents allows Hart to confer a definitive character on the reform of 1962, as if social processes have a point of closure.
Jose Ortega y Gasset, in Mission of the University and other related essays, declared: "Man inherently belongs to a generation and every generation is not installed in any place, but with great precision on the previous. This means that it is forced live up to the times and especially to the height of the ideas of the time."
Between the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Father José Agustín Caballero, Tomás Romay Chacón, Félix Varela, José de la Luz y Caballero, José Martí and Enrique José Varona, among many others, made strenuous efforts to situate education at the height of its times. It follows that education reform is an ongoing process that does not support "definitive" and that from this continuity emerged University Autonomy as unavoidable necessity of modernism.
In the Republic, Carlos de la Torre, in his inaugural speech as Rector of the University of Havana in 1921, outlined a program to reform the university and achieve University Autonomy, which for him was: "to authorize the University to manage in all its affairs in full independence, except as regards the management of its funds." The following year the Rector of the University of Buenos Aires, Joseph Maples, gave a lecture on "the evolution of Argentine universities," in which he explained the process begun with the manifesto of Cordoba, 1918, which led to a university reform whose centerpiece was the autonomy and the involvement of students in university government.
In this context a group of Cuban students published a manifesto in which they called for the formation of student association, which was founded in December 1922 under the name of Federation of University Students (FEU). Subsequently, on January 10, 1923, the fledgling federation issued the Document of the University Reform Program in Cuba, which called for "The status of the university and its autonomy in economic and educational matters." To remedy the situation, Enrique Jose Varona proposed creating a commission composed of professors and students to study the project, which upon acceptance led to the establishment of the Joint Commission, composed of the Rector, teachers and members of the FEU and recognized by Presidential Decree.
The project was analyzed by the Joint Commission, the Rector, the Board, teachers and students who went to the Presidential Palace and submitted to President Alfredo Zayas, the bases of the bill for University Autonomy. Zayas, before the force of the reform movement, legally recognized the FEU and authorized the creation of the University Assembly, composed of professors, graduates and students. The advance led reform in October 1923, at the First National Student Congress, which demanded the repeal of the Platt Amendment and agreed to establish the José Martí Popular University to open the doors of the higher educational establishment to the workers.
During the government of Gerardo Machado the University Assembly was dissolved and the FEU outlawed, but the struggle continued. Finally on September 10, 1933, after the fall of Machado, the Government of the Hundred Days, led by Ramon Grau San Martin issued Decree Law 2059 of October 1933, which enacted University Autonomy. Subsequently, the failure of the March 1935 strike, the University was taken over militarily and the government revoked the autonomy.
In 1939, under President Federico Laredo Bru, University Autonomy was restored and the Constituent Assembly was convened which adopted and drafted the Constitution of 1940, which, in Article 53, upheld the constitutionality of the Autonomous University as follows: "The University of Havana is autonomous and shall be governed in accordance with its Statutes and the Law by which they will be tempered." Thanks to this they could form the forces that faced the military coup of 1952, though Fulgencio Batista overthrew the dangerous University Autonomy with the repeal of the Constitution of 1940.
In January 1959, rather than the promise of restoring the 1940 Constitution, as we read in History Will Absolve Me, it was reformed, without consultation, to confer to the Prime Minister the powers of Head of Government and to the Council of Ministers functions of Congress, an amendment similar to what Batista had done with the statutes that replaced the constitution after the 1952 coup. It then proceeded to dismantle civil society and all its instruments, including the University Autonomy.
To accomplish this, the Supreme Council of Universities was created, made up of professors and students from three universities in the country and government representatives. This Council developed the draft University Reform presented on January 10, 1962. That same year, the Cuban Communist leader, Carlos Rafael Rodriguez, in an article published in the press, stated that the new university would be governed jointly by teachers and students, but said, "to the extent that the university revolution is the work of a real revolution and that socialism presides over the transformations, we can not think of teachers and students as two opposing groups… A professor of revolutionary consciousness, guided by Marxism-Leninism and a member of that ideology for years [he was referring to Juan Marinello], will have no need of the watchful presence of students with him in the governance of the University, because he will have the maturity to approach problems of higher education with certain criteria. "
Thus, University Autonomy, without having been lawfully repealed, in fact ceased to exist. Since then the University, one of the most important sources of social change in our history, was rendered inoperable for that purpose. One of its worst consequences is that under such control, the State raised the slogan of "The University is for the revolutionaries," which resulted in the expulsion of hundreds of students and teachers who did not share the ideology of the system.
The result could be no other. With the intention of giving finality to a changing process, the University, with the loss of autonomy, ceased to be nerve center of civil society. Therefore, the changes that are taking place in the economy have to be complemented by changes in the rights and freedoms, including University Autonomy, which is an inescapable necessity to put the University in step with the times.
(Published in Diario de Cuba on Monday, January 16, 2012: http://www.diariodecuba.com/cuba/9112-reforma-universitaria-sin-autonomía)
January 20 2012
Texas agricultural exports to Cuba continue growth
Texas agricultural exports to Cuba continue growthFebruary 6, 2012 By: Blair Fannin
COLLEGE STATION – Though tightly controlled, there are opportunities for Texas agricultural producers and businesses to capitalize on potential exports of food products to Cuba, according to a Texas AgriLife Extension Service economist.
Dr. Parr Rosson, AgriLife Extension economist and director of the Center for North American Studies at Texas A&M University in College Station, said the Cuban economy has held its own amid world economic turbulence.
Dr. Parr Rosson, Texas AgriLife Extension Service economist.
Thanks to the Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act of 2000, U.S. businesses may export food, agricultural and forestry products and medicines to Cuba.
Texas supplies Cuba with several export items, including chicken leg quarters, corn and wheat. U.S. corn exports to Cuba saw more than a 200 percent increase in value in 2011 to $109 million during the January-November period as Cuba uses more corn products for poultry feeding operations and other uses.
"We've begun to see some higher quality beef cuts enter the Cuban market as well," Rosson said. Pork, cotton and dairy products produced in Texas are also exported there.
"Pears, apples, raisins and dry (pinto) beans were exported in 2011, along with corn chips and potato chips," Rosson said. "These are products that we are seeing more interest in due to the growing tourism market in Cuba."
International visitors are increasing, Rosson said, with 2.7 million traveling to the island in 2011, 7 percent above 2010 and a new record. Revenue from tourism exceeded $2 billion, providing more money for Cubans to use in purchasing imported foods. Canada is the top visitor, Rosson said, with 900,000 going to Cuba in 2011.
"They are more likely to go during the winter months," he said. "They can fly from Canada directly to the major beach resort of Varadero."
Those resorts serve many items, including chips, fresh fruit and table cuts of beef and pork.
"The downside is that Cuba is attempting to implement several economic reforms and design a new more market-oriented path for their economy," Rosson said. "It creates some instability and uncertainty."
Rosson said Cuba is "very proficient" in producing certain tropical crops such as sugar, tobacco, citrus and vegetables grown in greenhouses, but other crops such as rice, wheat and corn struggle due to high humidity, insects, disease and the high cost of production.
"And, of course, hurricanes are a threat with each season," he said.
Cuba also lacks consistent agricultural credit, so some crop and livestock production is constrained.
"They rely on joint ventures with Spain and China to finance many agribusiness opportunities," he said.
Agricultural commodities, such as dry beans for example, are shipped out of Corpus Christi. Corn and wheat grown in the Lone Star State ships out of the port of Houston, Rosson said.
The Cuban government's buying agency, Empressa Cubana Importada de Alimentos (Alimport), handles all U.S. exports to the island, Rosson said.
"Alimport is Cuba's exclusive agent for all purchases from the U.S. and negotiates purchases, handles documents and arranges logistics and transportation of goods," Rosson said.
Before a U.S. firm can take product samples or export its products to Cuba, Rosson said each product must be reviewed and licensed by the Office of Exporter Services, Bureau Industry and Security, U.S. Department of Commerce.
"The license is free and is valid for one year," Rosson said. More information on licensing requirements can be found at www.bis.doc.gov.
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Contacts
Dr. Parr Rosson, 979-845-3070, prosson@tamu.edu
http://agrilife.org/today/2012/02/06/texas-agricultural-exports-to-cuba-continue-growth/
Cuba, Where Sheep Are Trained To Venerate Wolves
Op/Ed – 1/31/2012 @ 11:15AM
Cuba, Where Sheep Are Trained To Venerate Wolves
With the death of Cuban dissident Wilman Villar Mendoza, Cuba has lost one of its precious remaining brave souls. While a sputtering dissident movement shows occasional signs of life, reminding us of the hell the Cuban people endure, it casts a pale shadow compared to the fury of the Arab Spring. How is it possible that the Castro brothers have been able to run one of the world's most repressive and dysfunctional gulags for so long without their meeting the fate of the Ceausescus by now?
Their technique of how to introduce communism on an island scale is worth studying.
First, take a geographic area and build a firewall around it. Allow an elite group of monomaniacal thugs to subject the people trapped inside to five decades of brutal repression, privation, confiscation, and humiliation, all bolstered by relentless propaganda designed to convince victims and observers alike that this is necessary for the greater glory of the revolution.
Second, enlist an army of global intellectuals to manufacture a smokescreen of respectability for a governing philosophy that extols the virtues of equality and sacrifice, despite the fact that it delivers the equality of poverty and the sacrifice of self respect. Build a few Potemkin village medical facilities to fool the gullible into believing some noble purpose or higher achievement motivates the endeavor.
Third, make it is risky, but not impossible, for anyone who possesses the ambition and courage to rebel to escape instead.
Finally, marinate for two generations as you chase off the best and the brightest and observe what happens to the character of the people that survive.
Welcome to Cuba, where the human spirit has been so thoroughly crushed that a nation of sheep passively waits for their predatory wolves to die of old age, safely in their beds, not a hand raised against them.
Given the Cuban people's apparent resignation to their own fate, is it any surprise that the rest of us just shake our heads in wonder and go about our business, our political leaders impotently decrying the occasional human rights outrage that escapes the censors and makes it into the news?
When the nightmare runs its course and the complete story is finally told, there will be no redeeming chapters.
But what about the lower-than-average infant mortality and longer life expectancy touted by the Castro regime's boosters, if such statistics can be believed? Isn't living longer an end that justifies the means? Think about what living longer implies if you're forced to live under tyranny. America's founders—and indeed, the leaders of the Central and South American independence movements—preferred death to that sort of life, and said so with their words and deeds.
What about the famously low crime rate, where a midnight stroller is safer in Havana than in Washington, DC? Yes, violent crime is a government monopoly in a police state. Plus, in a country that has so little, there is nothing much to steal. After all, how many iPhones can get ripped off when nobody can afford one and posting the wrong thing on Twitter can earn you a visit from state security?
It'll be interesting to see what happens to a demoralized people after Castroism breathes its final breath. A new pack of wolves might try to keep the workers' paradise going, but at this point even the most devoted cadres may well be weary of the experiment. Look for them to enrich themselves by "privatizing" the economy Russian oligarch-style, as they carve up the island to remodel it into the Caribbean resort destination it has every right to be—so long as the "right" people profit.
A brief vintage car export market will likely open up as the world's largest living auto museum sells off its collection. Prostitution will return, or more precisely come out of the shadows, perhaps along with the revival of what once was a thriving pornography industry. It's hard to imagine a manufacturing base springing up to take advantage of the cheap labor as this needs to be coupled with a work ethic, something the Castro regime has made every effort to destroy. Surely, some unique comparative advantage will come to the fore. But having tolerated the intolerable for so long, will the Cuban people know what to do with their newfound freedom once liberated from their chains?
That is the experiment that awaits the return of capitalism.
One can imagine a scenario in which an influx of returning expats, rich in both human and financial capital, blow past the locals as they reintroduce the courage, entrepreneurship, and work ethic they took with them when they escaped. A two-tier society could easily emerge, with returnees and their children lording their success over the bewildered and resentful locals. Petty theft likely will make a comeback, so expect a vigorous market for alarm and security services.
Cubans who have managed to get an advanced education under Castro, like the many doctors staffing its medical system, will probably do fine, though many might move to the U.S. seeking better pay, filling our looming doctor shortage. Cigar exports will spike, although once Cuban cigars lose their naughty cachet they will have to compete with many excellent products produced by Cuba's neighbors. And the music industry will thrive once it is coupled with international distribution—some talents just cannot be stamped out.
But what will happen to the rest of the populace? Many might go to work as the cooks, dishwashers, waiters, and hotel maids that will surely be in demand when Club Med comes to town. They'll be much better off than they are now. But don't expect that to stop the mainstream media from running nostalgic stories about the equality that should have, would have, and could have been had Marxism only been implemented properly.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/billfrezza/2012/01/31/cuba-where-sheep-are-trained-to-venerate-wolves/
Cuba reports big increase in food prices
Cuba reports big increase in food pricesBy Marc Frank
HAVANA | Tue Jan 31, 2012 3:09pm EST
(Reuters) – Cubans paid almost 20 percent more for food in 2011 as economic reforms, reduced imports and stagnating farm production touched off price inflation at the country's many produce markets.
The National Statistics Office reported on its website (ONE.CU) that meat prices rose 8.7 percent while produce prices were up 24.1 percent, for an average of 19.8 percent.
The report was bad news for President Raul Castro, who has been loosening the state's grip on farming and retail food services and sales as it seeks to reform its Soviet-style economy by allowing more private initiative and market forces to kick in.
The changes are part of more than 300 reforms adopted by the ruling Communist Party last year to "update" the economy, which authorities have warned will entail a difficult transition.
Similar reforms in other state-monopolized economies have proved inflationary in the early stages, but the Cuban government hoped increased output would mitigate price increases.
President Castro has made agricultural reform and increased food production a top priority since taking over for ailing brother Fidel Castro in 2008.
But agricultural output increased just 2 percent last year, after falling 2.5 percent in 2010 and remains below 2005 levels.
At the same time, Castro has cut food imports to reduce spending by the debt-ridden government. Because of low farm output, Cuba imports a budget-busting 60 percent to 70 percent of the food it consumes.
Castro also has allowed farmers to sell a growing percentage of their production for whatever price the market will bear.
Rising prices have provoked much grumbling from Cubans, whose buying power has shrunk under Castro's changes.
"Everything is going up, except wages. What I bought yesterday for a peso, today costs 1.10 pesos or 1.20 pesos, but I continue to earn the same," said a Havana office worker who gave her name only as Angelina.
While all Cubans get a subsidized monthly food ration, it is not enough to get by, so they must purchase additional food at the produce markets or other places not included in the statistics office report.
The increased prices are sure to have a big impact on the estimated 40 percent of the population who rely on state wages or pensions and do not have access to other sources of income, such as remittances from relatives abroad.
The average wage increased only a few percentage points to the equivalent of $19 per month in 2011, the government reported, while pensions, which average just over the equivalent of $10 dollars per month, remained the same.
"There is no doubt prices are rising, and from what I can see on the news the problem is worldwide," Yoandry Leyva, who sells plumbing and other supplies in eastern Santiago de Cuba, said in a telephone interview.
"But I live in Cuba and the problems are mine. Every day the prices go up and I keep earning the same. I hope they settle down because every day is more difficult," he said.
(Editing by Jeff Franks; Editing by Sandra Maler)
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/31/us-cuba-inflation-idUSTRE80U1TS20120131
Cuban communists OK term limits for party and government officials
Posted on Monday, 01.30.12
Cuban communists OK term limits for party and government officials
At the Cuban Communist Party's first national conference, term limits are approved for government and party officials.By Juan O. Tamayojtamayo@ElNuevoHerald.com
Cuba's Communist Party Sunday cleared the way for a long-term renovation of its Central Committee that might hint at the island's future leaders, while Raúl Castro issued a strong call for openness within the party and mass media — but only up to a point.
Closing a first-ever National Conference of the party, Castro as expected also confirmed that party and government officials will be limited to two five-year terms. He and brother Fidel have ruled Cuba since 1959.
Conference delegates also unanimously approved replacing up to 20 percent of the 115 Central Committee members over the next five years, a move that could shine a spotlight on younger leaders that will succeed the 80-year-old Castro.
Overall, however, the two-day conference fulfilled Castro's caution earlier this month that Cubans should not have too many "illusions" about the two-day, closed-door gathering of more than 800 delegates.
Castro spoke several times about the need to support and carry out the ambitious open-market reforms approved in April by a party congress — its supreme form of gathering — to rescue the Soviet styled economy from the doldrums.
The Central Committee will hold two plenum meetings per year to watch over the reforms as well as the annual budgets and production goals and keep them from "falling into a broken bag," he announced.
Castro also punched away at one of his complaints at virtually every one of his public appearances — the corruption at virtually every level of Cuban life that has been undermining his efforts at reforms.
"Corruption is "one of the principal enemies of the revolution, much more prejudicial than the subversive and meddlesome programs of the U.S. government," he declared, referring to Washington's pro-democracy programs in Cuba.
"The party will definitively assume the conduct" of the fight against corruption, he added, without giving details. Castro created the post of comptroller general after he assumed power to crack down on the corruption.
He urged party members to become more "democratic" and openly debate Cuba's myriad problems, adding that to abandon the island's one-party system would be "to legalize the party or parties of the [U.S.] empire."
Cuba's mass media, all party or state controlled, need to report on the debate "with responsibility and the most strict veracity," he added, "not in the bourgeois style, full of sensationalism and lies, but with proven objectivity and without useless secretiveness."
During the 40-minute address, Castro also ground away at party issues like the need for hard work, ethics and discipline, and he told party officials to not meddle in decisions that should be left up to the government officials.
"The only thing that can defeat the revolution and socialism in Cuba would be our incapacity to correct the errors committed in the last 50 years … and those that we could make in the future," Castro declared.
Marino Murillo, the island "reform tsar" in charge of guiding and enforcing the economic changes, was quoted as acknowledging that more changes are needed but adding "that there's a limit — the socialist system is untouchable."
And delegate Yosvani Verdial was quoted as saying that while the party wants young members, "we want youths who are committed, who are patriots, who are unconditional" supporters of the communist system.
One intriguing report noted that Castro's daughter Mariela Castro, who was not a delegate but was invited to address a Conference working group, had proposed amending a document to use the word "dialogue," a word much disliked by the government.
Mariela proposed "including the word in a direct way, where it had appeared more implicitly," Arleen Rodriguez Derivet, a journalist who runs the nightly public affairs TV show Mesa Redonda, wrote in the government's CubaDebate Web page.
Rodriguez added that if she herself had been a delegate, she would have approved the change, but gave no details on whether the change was approved, or how the word would have affected the document.
Castro's daughter, who heads the Cuban National Center for Sex Education, has at times said she favors more and faster changes in Cuba, and at times fiercely defended the communist system and her father's rule.
In another odd line in her report, Rodriguez asked whether the work of the Conference could be seen as "social engineering?" Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin's goals for creating selfless communists were often referred to as "social engineering."
José Ramón Machado Venture, No. 2 to Raúl Castro in both the government and the party, noted that nearly 43 percent of the delegates were women and 37.5 percent were black or "mestizo," percentages higher than in the party's 800,000 members.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/01/29/2614707/cuban-communists-ok-term-limits.html
Dissident blogger says Cubans wanted more from Brazilian visit
Posted on Thursday, 02.02.12
Dissident blogger says Cubans wanted more from Brazilian visit
The Brazilian leader had vowed to make human rights a cornerstone of her foreign policy pointed to the U.S. detention camp for suspected terrorists at Guantánamo Bay on the island's southeastern tip.By Matthew BristowBloomberg News
HAVANA — Cuban blogger Yoani Sanchez said her compatriots had hoped for more from Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, who avoided criticizing the human rights situation on the communist island during a state visit to Havana this week.
Sanchez said she had looked for at least a "small wink" from Rousseff, who was imprisoned and tortured for fighting Brazil's dictatorship in the 1960s, after a jailed dissident, Wilman Villar, died last month following a hunger strike and President Raul Castro vowed to maintain single-party rule.
"It was pure chance that she came at this time, but people had hoped for more," Sanchez said in an interview last night in Havana. "I would've hoped for a small wink, a phrase with a double meaning that we could interpret, and that the government could interpret too."
Rousseff, who concludes a three-day visit to Havana today, said that it was an internal matter for Cuba to decide whether to allow Sanchez to leave the island after Brazil last week granted the 36-year-old blogger an entry visa to attend next month a screening of a documentary she appears in. Sanchez, a critic of the Castro government on the Generation Y blog, has been denied permission to leave Cuba for four years.
"Brazil gave the visa to the blogger," Rousseff, 64, told reporters yesterday in Havana before meeting with Castro and his brother Fidel. "The rest is not a matter for the Brazilian government."
Rousseff, who has vowed to make human rights a cornerstone of her foreign policy, failed to comment on the Cuban government's record, pointing instead to the U.S. detention camp for suspected terrorists at Guantánamo Bay on the island's southeastern tip.
"He who throws the first stone has a roof made of glass," said Rousseff, whose Workers' Party has long supported Cuba. "We in Brazil have our problems too."
While critical of the Brazilian president's stance, Sanchez said Rousseff's silence is preferable to her predecessor and mentor Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's siding with the Castro government after the death of another jailed hunger striker in 2010, she added.
"I wake up every day and say to myself, today I am going to behave like a free person," Sanchez said. "Dilma once said the same. She paid a high personal and physical cost, but in the end life proved her right and Brazil became a democracy."
Julia Sweig, an author of publications on Cuba and Brazil, said criticism of the Castro government is more widespread today than it's ever been since the 1959 revolution and taking many forms that escape the attention of foreign governments and media. As Cuba's second-biggest investor, helping Castro ease state control of the economy, Brazil is well-positioned to discuss the island's rights record behind the scenes in a productive manner, she added.
"Yoani's situation bears zero comparison to what Dilma went through," said Sweig, director of the Latin America program at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington. "Unlike Dilma, she hasn't been and won't be jailed or tortured and I seriously doubt she's going to be president of Cuba."
Cuba's government relies on beatings, short-term detentions, forced exile and travel restrictions to repress virtually all forms of political dissent, New York-based Human Rights Watch said in a report this month. Cuba denies it's holding any political prisoners and considers dissident activity to be counterrevolutionary supported by anti-Castro "mercenaries" in the U.S.
While blocked from traveling abroad, Sanchez has emerged as a leader among a group of young dissidents who describe the daily travails of life in Cuba through difficult-to-access social media. Many of her chronicles are published by newspapers throughout Latin America. She has also written a book, "Havana Real: One Woman Fights to Tell the Truth About Cuba Today."
Sanchez said the visibility she has gained through blogging gives her some protection from the Cuban government.
"The day I stop blogging, they'll put me on trial," she said.
Rousseff, who travels to Haiti today, discussed the possibility of hosting Raul Castro at a future date, according to a Brazilian official with the president who isn't authorized to comment on the two leaders' talks publicly.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/02/02/2620793/dissident-blogger-says-cubans.html#storylink=misearch
Conjectures About 2012 / Miriam Celaya
Conjectures About 2012 / Miriam CelayaMiriam Celaya, Translator: Norma Whiting
A recurring theme among the last days of 2011 and early 2012 by Cubans and foreign individuals interested in the Cuban reality has been about the outlook for the year just begun, given the chronic nature of the national economic crisis, the ongoing measures (reforms) of the General-President, with his Galapagos kind of pace, the announced increase in the worldwide recession and the political events that will have an important influence on the situation in the medium term, namely, the presidential elections that will take place in the United States and, fundamentally, those in Venezuela.
The warning signs that constitute the tip of an iceberg floating adrift erratically became more pronounced in Cuba in 2011: the removal of some subsidies, the end of the monthly lifetime allowance in hard currency (50 CUC) to staff having completed health "missions" in other Third World countries, the shut-down of several work centers and other silent layoffs, the reduction in ALBA (Bolivarian Alliance of the Peoples of Our Americas) student programs, especially at the Latin American Medical School, increases in food prices and other staples, worsening economic living conditions in the poorest sectors of society (the majority), in contrast against increases in the standard of living of a small sector of the new middle class, among others. This, coupled with the general apathy and the growing feeling of helplessness on the part of groups that will not benefit from Raulista measures, is a picture that points to the further deterioration of social situations and the potential increases in crime, among other adverse factors.
One of the strongest contradictions is the slow pace of government reforms, which, so far, has been unable to stop the deterioration of the system, compared to the rapid social impoverishment that is directly reflected in the disappointment, uncertainty, and lack of confidence in the future, especially a future dependent on the power group that controls both the macro economy and national politics. There don't seem to be many flattering indicators, or reasons for hope. If the welfare of Cuban families hinges on setting up a kiosk or an eatery, on remittances received from relatives abroad –those who have that luxury- or on expectations that hang on the generosity of the government, we might as well start turning out the lights and closing the doors: that is not a future.
On the other hand, none of the new economic "rights" has been matched by social and political rights, as is logical under totalitarian regimes. Cubans have been so thoroughly disenfranchised and have been subjected to such "paternalistic" controls that even we in the opposition factions and independent civil society have sometimes unconsciously wished that freedom of expression, of association and of the press be "allowed", as if they weren't natural rights inherent to the human condition. What can we expect from others who have let discouragement win!
Nevertheless, 2011 was also witness to a surge in alternative and civic groups and to obvious links between the two. A spontaneous process of modest but visible growth has been taking place within the independent civil society, which could be consolidating gradually. Undoubtedly, though it is a small sector, corresponding to the conditions of the dictatorship, this is the reflection of the will of Cubans with emancipated mentalities, determined not to ask permission to be free, convinced that it is vital to transform reality within ourselves. A few years ago this was unthinkable. Similarly, along with the growth of civic spaces, we can expect strong resistance from the authorities, and an eventual increase in repression.
The fate of one and all in this 2012 will be marked, among other situational factors, by the interests that have already been outlined more clearly, which, in very general terms, are: the olive green elite and all of its caste, by virtue of recycling itself in order to maintain power; the great entrepreneurs, members of that same caste or associated with it, for maintaining an economic monopoly and increasing their private capitals; new small businessmen and owners, for increasing their profits, making use of the meager reforms, and perhaps for fighting for other reforms; the ever-unfortunates, for surviving another year of shortages; we, the disobedient dreamers, for increasing activism in order to promote awareness of democratic changes and for seeking new ways to foster them.
Some readers may think I'm pessimistic, but that is not the case. My greatest optimism consists precisely in viewing reality face-to-face and continuing to wish for changes. Today, the despair of tens of thousands of Cubans is one of the main allies of the regime. However, we must not give up. We might find the opportunity and perform a miracle in the midst of all this dark, murky and imprecise present. Nobody knows how much time we have left, but it is not the time to throw in the towel. Those of us who are alive and want to achieve will not allow fatigue and defeat to win the game.
Translated by Norma Whiting
January 9 2012
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