Revolutionary Racism in Cuba
Revolutionary Racism in CubaJune 21, 2011
This analysis was prepared by COHA Research Associate Naomi Glassman
Revolutionary Racism: Afro‑Cubans in an Era of Economic Change
Fidel Castro's regime enacted anti-discrimination legislation and redistributive reforms benefiting Afro-Cubans Afro-Cubans are disproportionately affected by Cuba's economic struggles and change U.S. dollars from remittances, tourism and paladares contribute to growing inequality along racial lines Cultural and educational representations continue to perpetuate negative stereotypes
Cuba's economy has struggled during the fifteen years since the fall of the Soviet Union, bringing economic disparity of an increasingly racial nature. Cuba's population is split primarily between whites, mestizos and Afro‑Cubans (blacks and mulattos), with the percentage of Afro-Cubans varying between 62 percent[i] and 33 percent[ii] depending on the source. Like most former colonies, Cuba's history of racism originated with the arrival of colonial Spanish settlers and their subordinated African slaves. Cuba was one of the last Latin American countries to abolish slavery, by means of a royal decree issued by the Spanish King in 1886.
In his 1891 essay "Nuestra América," Cuban author and independence fighter José Martí stated that there is no racism in Cuba because there are no races.[iii] He argued that Cuban unity and identity depended on all Cubans identifying as Cubans, instead of racially. White Cubans have often cited Martí's position subsuming race to national unity as an argument that racism is not an issue in Cuba because "we are all Cubans." But the legacy of slavery lingered, and was exacerbated by Cuba's semi-colonial status under U.S. hegemony. Interactions with wealthy, white, prejudiced visitors from the U.S. contributed to social and economic divisions along racial lines. Afro-Cubans endured segregated facilities, discrimination under the guise of eugenics, and blatant racism at the hands of groups as extreme as the Ku Klux Klan Kubano.[iv]
After the triumph of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro acknowledged the prevalence of racism and launched a set of reforms intended to eliminate racial disparity in public spaces, education and employment. However, he failed to adequately address its cultural and societal roots. After a few years, he declared his policies a success and made any further discussion of race or racial inequality a counterrevolutionary crime, insisting that talk of race would divide the nation. During Castro's reign, the silence on issues of racism made further debate or improvements impossible, countering the initial benefits of his reforms. Even though the Castro government achieved more for blacks in fifty years than previous administrations had in the last 400 years,[v] his policies only addressed issues of unequal access without changing structural biases underlying society. With a new wave of economic changes affecting the country, race and racism are once again becoming important issues in Cuba.
Race and the Revolution
When Castro first came to power in Cuba, the Afro‑Cuban population was disproportionately poor and marginalized, lacking sufficient medical care, social services and educational opportunities. Castro believed that such overt racism was in direct conflict with his commitment to social justice and equality and passed policies to desegregate beaches, parks, work sites and social clubs. He outlawed all forms of legal and overt discrimination, including discrimination in employment and education. Castro also worked to increase the number of Afro-Cuban political representatives, with the percentage of Black members on the Council of State expanding from 12.9% in 1976 to 25.8% by 2003. However, overall, Afro-Cuban representation decreased as the institutions become more powerful.[vi]
Castro's redistributive social and economic reforms had a positive and measurable impact on the quality of life for Afro‑Cubans. The government's great achievements in extending education and medical benefits to all Cubans have narrowed racial disparities in life expectancy and matriculation rates. Alejandro de la Fuente, Professor of History at the University of Pittsburgh, used statistics from the 1981 census to illustrate the progress made during twenty years of Revolutionary rule. He found that by 1981 there was a gap of only one year in life expectancy rates between whites and non‑whites, which proved that Cuba had achieved relatively equal access to such indicators as "nutrition, health care, maternal care and education."[vii] Moreover, educational reforms contributed to improved literacy and education levels across the island. By 1981, the percentage of blacks (11.2 percent) and mulattos (9.6 percent) who had graduated from high school were higher than those for whites (9 percent) leading to equivalent proportions of blacks, mulattos and whites in professional jobs.[viii] With education came improved opportunities for social mobility, as a mass exodus of wealthy white professionals to the United States after the Revolution, created many more professional opportunities for the previously marginalized Afro-Cuban.[ix] Similar social justice initiatives such as "wage increases, social security improvements, the provision of public services gratis or at nominal cost, and the gradual spread of rationing" further benefited the economically marginalized .[x] Government jobs were often distributed in a non-confrontational affirmative action style, giving "hiring preference to those who had the greatest family need and lowest income," which again had a disproportional benefit for Afro‑Cubans.[xi] In areas with complete government control, such as education, employment and health care, social justice policies led to increased equality and improved services and opportunities for Afro-Cubans.
Three years into his rule, Fidel Castro declared that the Revolution had eliminated racism, making any further discussion of racial inequalities a taboo subject. Official discourse directly tied racism to capitalism, and thus the development of an egalitarian society officially ended racism. The government connected racial discrimination to the colonial and 'semicolonial' legacies[xii] and "to the capitalist elite, who had emigrated to Miami, officially making it a nonissue in Cuba."[xiii] Castro's government sought to develop a national Cuban identity and discussions of race and inequality were seen as creating divisions where none existed. For fifty years of Castro rule in Cuba, race and racism were taboo subjects, making debate, discourse, and study impossible.[xiv] Later developments have proven that racism was not actually eliminated, just improved and pushed underground.
Economic Reforms and Racial Inequality
The Special Period, the difficult decade following the fall of the Soviet Union, caused economic hardships for all Cubans. The government stopped numerous social services and the country struggled with widespread shortages. During this period, the structural legacy of racism meant that Afro‑Cubans faced a greater brunt of the economic challenges. Many of the economic reforms passed to bring the Cuban economy out of its deep recession served only to exacerbate these racial inequalities. When faced with a economic stagnation, the Revolution's commitment to social justice lost ground to the need for economic recovery, especially given the official belief that racism was no longer an issue, the racist implications of economic reforms were not an issue for the Castro government.
Without Soviet sugar subsidies, Cuba's economic development shifted to the growing tourist trade. While the tourist industry is currently the most profitable sector because of the availability of USD, it is also the industry with the greatest racial disparity in employment opportunities: Afro‑Cubans hold only five percent of jobs in the tourist sector.[xv] The tourist resorts hire primarily whites, drawing on the structural legacy of racism and the pervasive cultural belief that white is superior. Jobs in the tourist sector require less education and skills, meaning that Afro‑Cuban advances in education in the early years of the Revolution no longer translate to economic success.
Remittances—transfers of money into Cuba from Cubans living and working abroad—are a new source of unregulated USD in the Cuban economy. Remittances primarily benefit white Cubans, because the majority of Cubans who emigrated after the Revolution were white or lighter‑skinned mestizo. Statistically speaking, "83.5 percent of Cuban immigrants living in the US identify themselves as whites. Assuming that dollar remittances are evenly distributed among white and non‑white exiles and that they stay, roughly, within the same racial group of the sender, then about 680 out of the 800 million dollars that enter the island every year would end up in white hands."[xvi] Cuba has limited data on the quantity and distribution of remittances, but a 2000 survey in Havana found that "although income levels were fairly even across racial groups before remittances, white households outspent black households in dollar stores and in the purchase of major household appliances."[xvii] Both in the sending and consumption of goods, remittances provide greater economic benefit to white Cuban households.
The Castro government began legalizing personal enterprises for profit during the Special Period. Since then, more and more Cubans have opened their own restaurants or repair shops. However, in 2000, the Havana Survey found that 77 percent of the self‑employed were white, and that these white entrepreneurs were more economically successful in comparison to their Afro‑Cuban counterparts.[xviii] Once again, blacks face disadvantages because they lack the capital in USD from tourism and remittances: it often takes an initial investment, such as a bicycle for deliveries, or real estate that could be used as a storefront or neighborhood restaurant to start up a new business. Afro‑Cubans are also disadvantaged when it comes to the development of paladares, or small restaurants run out of the home. The quality of housing was not addressed in the original anti‑discriminatory reforms, and Afro‑Cubans are still concentrated in overcrowded and dilapidated housing areas, limiting their opportunities for owning and opening paladares.
Re‑opening Debate
Faced with growing racial inequality from the economic difficulties of the Special Period in a speech on September 8, 2000, Fidel Castro officially reestablished the issue of race as a subject for debate and improvement:
I am not claiming that our country is a perfect model of equality and justice. We believed at the beginning that when we established the fullest equality before the law and complete intolerance for any demonstration of sexual discrimination in the case of women, or racial discrimination in the case of ethnic minorities, these phenomena would vanish from our society. It was some time before we discovered that marginality and racial discrimination with it are not something that one gets rid of with a law or even with ten laws, and we have not managed to eliminate them completely in 40 years.[xix]
Castro recognized that he was premature when he declared racism eliminated and admitted that, despite progress, there were gaps in the original reforms. In the documentary RAZA, Cuban citizens remark that there are equal rights before the law, but equal rights do not mean social equality: society is still racist because of widespread ignorance.[xx] While notable achievements were made in education and employment, areas such as cultural representation, police discrimination and housing lagged behind. Cuba still suffers from the legacy of centuries of discrimination followed by decades of silence.
The growing Cuban rap and hip‑hop movements have been instrumental in bringing issues of racism and discrimination back into the public eye. They are often explicit in descriptions of racism as lived experiences, challenging the official silence and the popular belief that it no longer exists in Cuba. In 1964, Afro‑Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén wrote the poem "Tengo" (I have) to celebrate the end of racial discrimination, saying: "I have, let's see / that being Black/ no one can stop me / at the door of a dance hall or bar … I have, let's see / that I have learned to read / to count … I have, that now I have / a place to work / and earn."[xxi] In 2009, with economic difficulties and the reemerging issue of racism, the Cuban hip‑hop group Hermanos de Causa rewrote the poem "to denounce the persistence of racial discrimination and the growing marginalization of blacks."[xxii] In their rap, also titled "Tengo" the lyrics now say: "I have a race dark and discriminated against / I have a workday that's exhausting and pays nothing / I have so many things I can't even touch / I have so many places where I can't even go."[xxiii] The shift in music lyrics is paradigmatic of the shifting debate on racism in Cuba.
Conclusion
For Afro‑Cubans, the next step is to continue reopening debate and discussion, including the positive representation of Afro‑Cubans in television programs and classroom curriculum. Cuba must begin with the advances achieved by the Revolution and then work to deepen the Revolution's commitment to social equality by rectifying the errors now evidenced in growing racial inequality.[xxiv] Television programs and educational materials on the island either completely ignore Afro‑Cuban culture or represent its negative stereotypes. Educational curricula teach the history of white Cuba, while ignoring the cultural roots of Africa, Afro‑Cubans and other marginalized groups. Esteban Morales, a PhD. at the University of Havana, says: "Whitening continues to be present and nourished in our education. We educate without mentioning color … we are teaching each other to be white. … it turns out that while we do not exclude blacks and mestizos from our classrooms, we do exclude them from the content of our curriculums."[xxv] While the government succeeded early on in passing desegregation legislation, it has failed to effect any changes in the public media and educational representation of Afro‑Cubans, thus perpetuating racial ignorance.
Finally, although Afro‑Cubans are the largest non‑white population on the island, focusing on racism only against Afro‑Cubans ignores the issues faced by Chinese, Jewish and indigenous peoples. Discussions and studies of race and racism on the island have been limited by the official silence, and much more investigation and research is needed to provide an accurate picture of the racial divisions on the island. Afro‑Cubans are economically, politically, socially, criminally, and culturally marginalized, yet many Cubans still refuse to recognize racism on the island. The anti-discrimination advances of the Revolution deserve to be lauded, but they should not leave us blind to the racism that exists and the continuing struggles of Afro-Cubans.
The references for this article can be found here:http://cohaforum.blogspot.com/2011/06/revolutionary-racism-in-cuba.html
Will More Political Prisoners Be Released?
Cuba: Will More Political Prisoners Be Released?Church Says There Is Still More to Do
HAVANA, Cuba, APRIL 19, 2011 (Zenit.org).- Cuban President Raúl Castro is stating that the process of releasing "prisoners of conscience" has ended, though the archbishopric of Havana noted that there is still work to be done.
On April 8, 37 former Cuban prisoners arrived in Madrid, Spain, after being released from prison according to an agreement initiated last July between the Cuban and Spanish governments, mediated by the Catholic Church.
On the day the prisoners arrived in Madrid, the Spanish foreign affairs ministry published a note in which it stated that the liberation process had been concluded as agreed upon.
At the end of the process, a total of 115 former prisoners arrived in Spain, accompanied by 647 relatives.
Castro also noted the fulfillment of this commitment in his address to the 6th Congress of the Cuban Communist Party (CCP) in Havana. He expressed gratitude to the Spanish government for its part in the process.
However, in a note published April 12, the archbishopric of Havana suggested that a similar dialogue could continue with governments of other countries that are prepared to receive former Cuban prisoners.
In addition to receiving the former prisoners, the Spanish authorities are providing aid in the form of economic assistance, housing, legal advice, psychological assistance, schooling of minors, including facilitating the approval of school and university titles, assistance in work integration and health care.
Three NGOs are also aiding the Cuban exiles: The Red Cross, the Spanish Commission of Aid to Refugees (CEAR), and the Spanish Catholic Commission of Migrations Association (ACCEM).
Many of the former prisoners are still waiting to receive work permits, Europa Press reported, and in the meantime are pursuing sporadic jobs in plumbing, masonry and carpentry.
In Castro's address, the president also invited his political party to engage in "severe self-criticism," so as to correct the deficiencies in the progress of the country.
Former prisoner of conscience Miguel Galbán Gutiérrez commented on the president's address, noting on his blog that Castro "has made some adjustments, some slight adjustments in his plans to avoid the riots of the Arab world splashing him and his angering the population."
Gutiérrez observed that Castro "is moving with caution, very well advised; the announced dismissals are partially blocked and the elimination of rationing has been slowed down."
Curbs on property continue: Raul
Curbs on property continue: RaulAP
Cuban President Raul Castro drew a line in the Caribbean sand across which Cuba's economic reforms must never go, telling delegates to a key Communist Party summit on Saturday he has rejected dozens of suggested reforms that would have allowed the concentration of property in private hands.
But he also strongly backed a line-up of economic changes which together represent a sea change for Cuba's socialist system, including the eventual elimination of the ration book and other subsidies, the decentralisation of the economy and a reliance on supply and demand in some sectors.
In a long speech, Mr. Raul Castro said the country had ignored its problems for too long.
He made clear Cuba had to make tough decisions if it wanted to survive. "No country or person can spend more than they have," he said. "Two plus two is four. Never five, much less six or seven as we have sometimes pretended."
Speaking forcefully to 1,000 delegates, the Cuban leader alternated between reassurance that the economic changes were compatible with socialism, and a candid assessment of what has not worked in the past.
Inaugurating the four-day meet, Mr. Raul Castro announced a series of reform proposals, including abolishing the decades-old food rationing system and allowing residents to buy and sell cars and real estate.
He said the monthly ration book of basic foods, perhaps the most cherished of subsidies, represented an "insupportable burden … and a disincentive for work". — AP, Xinhua
http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/article1704527.ece
A last hurrah for Cuba’s communist rulers
16 April 2011 Last updated at 09:58 GMT
A last hurrah for Cuba's communist rulersBy Michael Voss BBC News, Havana
Cuba's Communist Party is holding its first Congress in 14 years, and for the country's ageing leaders it could be one of their last opportunities to bask in the victories of days gone by.
The red flags are flying high in Havana. Buildings across the capital are decked out with giant Cuban flags.
One of the largest military parades seen in decades is scheduled to pass through Revolution Square, the symbolic political heart of the country.
The parade and Congress come exactly half a century after Fidel Castro proclaimed that his was a socialist revolution, rather than a democratic one.
His speech on 16 April 1961 paved the way for a centralised Soviet-style economy and one-party rule.Cuban soldiers rehearse for an upcoming parade to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Bay of Pigs at the Plaza de la Revolution in Havana, Cuba, Thursday April 14, 2011 Military prowess will be a big part of the celebrations
It came on the eve of the ill-fated landing by 1,400 CIA-backed Cuban exiles, who were defeated by Castro forces at Bay of Pigs (or Giron as the Cubans call it).
As a symbol of the revolution's future, thousands of youths will bring up the rear of Saturday's parade.
But as 79-year-old President Raul Castro warned last December, major changes are needed if the system is to survive once the ageing generation which led the revolution has gone.
"Either we change course or we sink," President Raul Castro said.
"We have the basic duty to correct the mistakes we have made over the course of five decades of building socialism in Cuba."Emerging entrepreneurs?
Cubans are greeting the prospect of change with a mixture of anticipation and trepidation.Graphic
With wages barely $20 (£12) a month, there is enormous pressure to implement economic changes that would allow people to earn a decent living.
Until now it has only been possible to survive thanks to food rationing and the heavy subsidies on housing, health and education.
But those handouts have bred a culture of dependency, with no incentives to work, and Cuba's struggling inefficient economy can no longer afford to be so generous.
The government has already launched a programme of allowing 250,000 extra people to become self-employed or set up small businesses with a limited number of employees.
Almost three-quarters of these licences have already been issued; there are small market stalls and cafes springing up across the island.
Congress is expected to endorse these changes, and there are hopes that it could clarify issues such as micro-credits and expand the number and types of jobs people are allowed to do.Rules, permits, restrictions
In terms of economic impact, a potentially more significant change would be to allow medium-sized state enterprises to become workers' co-operatives, taking them out of the clutches of the central planners.A worker arranges chairs for an upcoming parade to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Bay of Pigs failed invasion at Revolution Square or Plaza de la Revolucion in Havana, Cuba, Friday April 15, 2011 The Bay of Pigs – or Giron – landing is the stuff of legend in Cuba
Such co-operatives are now well-established in agriculture, where market reforms began at least three years ago.
It is unclear just how far the Communist Party is prepared to loosen state control.
Legalising the right to buy and sell cars and houses, and to travel abroad, are the bread-and-butter issues which will determine for many Cubans whether this is a truly reforming Congress or not.
Cubans are famous the world over for their ability to keep old 1940s and 50s American cars running on the roads. The secret is necessity. Under Cuban law the only cars that can be legally traded are those built before the revolution in 1959.
Most Cubans have the title to their homes and can pass them on to their children. But the only way to move home is to swap with someone. It is a cumbersome, complicated system where money does illegally change hands, including backhanders to the much derided state inspectors.
President Raul Castro has admitted that the system is a mess and encourages corruption. How far he will go in asking Congress to move on easing restrictions is far from clear.
Cubans need permission to leave the island. It is a deeply resented restriction. For the moment, though, hopes that Congress will take the initiative appear to be based more on wishful thinking than concrete evidence.A new leader emerges?
Phasing out subsidies is seen as a key element turning the debt ridden economy around. Some food and other items have already been taken off the universal monthly ration card. The whole system is expected to be abolished and replaced by some form of means tested benefit for those most in need.
Overstaffing in state-run enterprises is seen as another major problem which needs to be dealt with. Initially 500,000 workers were due to be laid off or reassigned to more productive jobs before Congress, followed by another million later on.A self-employed Cuban man selling DVDs waits for customers on April 15, 2011 in Caimito, Mayabeque province Cubans are hoping for a more liberal attitude towards small businesses
The whole process, though, has been put on ice. Alternatives are not in place and the authorities appear uneasy about the political consequences of a large number of disgruntled unemployed.
Congress may approve the concept but it could several years to implement.
There is one other major task which Congress is expected perform: selecting new party leaders.
The Communist Party of Cuba is the only political organisation allowed in this one-party state.
Constitutionally it is Congress which votes on the composition of a new Central Committee, which in turns names the First and Second Party secretaries, the two most important posts in the country.
President Raul Castro has to be the front-runner to take over from his brother Fidel.
The real interest is in who will become Second Secretary.
Could a younger potential leader be about to emerge or will the question of transition be put off once again with one of the trusted old guard stepping in?
Cuba admits food imports bill is up 25% and "miracles are running out"
Saturday, April 16th 2011 – 09:41 UTC
Cuba admits food imports bill is up 25% and "miracles are running out"
Cuba announced Friday that it will have to spend 25% more than its original estimates to pay the cost of food imports due to the international surge in commodity prices.
The Castro ruled island must import 80% of food supplies The Castro ruled island must import 80% of food supplies
In a statement published Friday in the Communist Party daily Granma, the president of state-owned importer Alimport, Igor Montero, said that the impact of the world crisis on the Cuban economy this year is expected to total more than 308 million US dollars for basic products.
"That means that all the growth expected in revenues from the export of nickel, services, sugar and other goods and services, will not be net gains but must be spent to cover the deficit of the food-import bill," Montero said.
There will also be "an increase in subsidies in proportions not contemplated in the plan" for the year, due to the "current structure of food distribution and sales," which includes consumers' use of rationing cards to buy a specific group of products at subsidized prices, he said.
Cuba imports close to 80% of the food supplies consumed by its 11 million inhabitants at a cost of some 1.5 billion USD per year.
Granma specifies that the expenditure goes mainly to buy wheat, corn, powdered milk, flour and soybean oil, which make up as much as 73% of the nation's food bill.
According to Montero, among the government's measures to check inflation has been to contract imports in the first months of the year and to buy commodity futures.
Montero said that the third strategy is to get moving with all projects aimed at increasing domestic agricultural production, which President Raul Castro has described as a matter of "national security" and is a priority in his plan of reforms.
"Thanks to the inexplicable contrivances of perseverance, much more than the real possibilities of our economy, our government pays whatever it costs so that, among the unprotected on this earth, there is not one Cuban," Granma said, referring to the humanitarian consequences of the food crisis.
"Nonetheless, ways of working miracles are running out, and in a world where the mathematics of trade increases its pragmatism, the more the whirlwind slams those who have the least, the more we must find in our own lands and industries the strength to escape its vortex," the newspaper said.
Commodities price surge boosts Cuba’s food-import bill
Commodities price surge boosts Cuba's food-import billPublished April 15, 2011EFE
Havana – Cuba announced Friday that it will have to spend 25 percent more than its original estimates to pay the cost of food imports due to the international surge in commodity prices.
In a statement published Friday in the Communist Party daily Granma, the president of state-owned importer Alimport, Igor Montero, said that the impact of the world crisis on the Cuban economy this year is expected to total more than $308 million for importing basic products.
"That means that all the growth expected in revenues from the export of nickel, services, sugar and other goods and services, will not be net gains but must be spent to cover the deficit of the food-import bill," Montero said.
There will also be "an increase in subsidies in proportions not contemplated in the plan" for the year, due to the "current structure of food distribution and sales," which includes consumers' use of rationing cards to buy a specific group of products at subsidized prices, he said.
Cuba imports close to 80 percent of the food supplies consumed by its 11 million inhabitants at a cost of some $1.5 billion per year.
Granma specifies that the expenditure goes mainly to buy wheat, corn, powdered milk, flour and soybean oil, which make up as much as 73 percent of the nation's food bill.
According to Montero, among the government's measures to check inflation has been to contract imports in the first months of the year and to buy commodity futures.
Montero said that the third strategy is to get moving with all projects aimed at increasing domestic agricultural production, which President Raul Castro has described as a matter of "national security" and is a priority in his plan of reforms.
"Thanks to the inexplicable contrivances of perseverance, much more than the real possibilities of our economy, our government pays whatever it costs so that, among the unprotected on this earth, there is not one Cuban," Granma said, referring to the humanitarian consequences of the food crisis.
"Nonetheless, ways of working miracles are running out, and in a world where the mathematics of trade increases its pragmatism, the more the whirlwind slams those who have the least, the more we must find in our own lands and industries the strength to escape its vortex," the newspaper said.
http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/money/2011/04/15/commodities-price-surge-boosts-cubas-food-import/
Cuba’s Remnant Rediscovers Religion
Cuba's Remnant Rediscovers ReligionLetter from HavanaBy Michael OrbachPublished March 30, 2011.
The hubbub surrounding Cuba's small Jewish community these days does not faze Yakob Berezniak Hernandez.
Sitting behind a desk crowded with a typewriter, several cans of Lieber's tomato paste and piles of loose foreign change, Hernandez, of Havana's Adath Israel synagogue, waved away inquiries about Alan Gross, the 61-year-old American Jewish contractor sentenced to 15 years in prison March 15. Gross was found guilty of seeking to clandestinely distribute Internet satellite communications equipment to Cuba's Jewish community on behalf of United States Agency for International Development.
"We have good relationships with the goyim," said Hernandez. "This is a paradise for religions. You can't find anti-Semites [here]. No one cares."
But several days later, it became clear that some people outside Cuba care a lot. When former President Jimmy Carter arrived in Cuba on March 28, he met almost immediately with Jewish community leaders, followed by meetings over the next two days with senior Cuban officials, including President Raul Castro. ABC News reported that the Gross case was a prominent part of his discussions with the Cuban officials.
The Gross case also shined a spotlight on the small Cuban-Jewish community or "Jubans," as they are known. While close to 95% of the Jewish population fled Cuba before or soon after the revolution, a remnant remained. Now numbering a little more than 1,000, the community has experienced a religious reawakening.
These days, 200 people or more pray every Sabbath in the El Patronato Bet Sholom Synagogue, the largest in Cuba, and close to 100 teenagers attend Sunday school, where they learn Hebrew and study about Judaism.
Adath Israel, located in the old Havana district, is the sole Orthodox synagogue in Cuba. Hernandez, a hulking, bearded 29-year-old, fulfills many roles in the congregation. He is the synagogue's cantor, public prayer reader, one-man burial committee and treasurer. After spending four months in Haifa in 2009 studying the laws of kashrut, he also became the community's sole shokhet, or ritual slaughterer, a task he fulfills five blocks away, in a butcher shop. (Meat, a luxury in Cuba, is regularly provided to members of the Jewish community under the national rationing system, instead of the pork rations others receive.)
Outside Hernandez's office, women knitted yarmulkes with Israeli and Cuban flags intertwined, which they sold to tourists for roughly $10, a little less than a month's salary for most Cubans.
While Israel and Cuba do not have formal diplomatic ties, Cuban Jews can make aliyah and leave the country, unlike their fellow citizens. Many Jews have immigrated to Israel, though Hernandez said that some have had trouble adjusting. "It's difficult to adapt to life in Israel," Hernandez said, citing the relaxed atmosphere of Cuba. "People that stay are very happy. It's a place to practice Judaism."
The Orthodox Adath Israel, which holds daily morning and afternoon-evening services, found a novel way to attract people in this country of scarcities to its gatherings: food. The synagogue provides a meal after both shacharit, the morning service, and mincha, the afternoon service.
Hernandez said that the congregation numbers 300 members, many of whom he claims keep kosher thanks to donations from the Jewish community of Panama. The synagogue bakes challah in its own kitchen; for Purim, Adath Israel baked hamantaschen. A new van, with the name and logo of the synagogue's website, was parked outside — a strange sight in Havana, where bicycle taxis and refurbished 1950s Chevrolets and DeSotos crowd the dusty streets. This relative wealth didn't stop members of the community from offering to sell cigars to a reporter.
Ruth Behar, a professor of anthropology at the University of Michigan and the author of "An Island Called Home: Returning to Jewish Cuba," said that the community is composed mainly of converts.
"There's a handful of Jews on both their mother and father's side," she said. "Most have converted because their father is Jewish or they have a grandparent. They're very much a larger part of Cuban society."
Outside Adath Israel, Bryam Ernesto Quirch Acosta, 21, an engineering student at the University of Havana whose grandfather was Jewish, explained why he came to the synagogue. "I feel sorry," he said in Spanish. "I don't know how to be Jewish."
The community's makeup has caused some problems for Lubavitch, the Hasidic sect famed for its worldwide outreach. The Orthodox synagogue broke ties with the group recently.
"They make propaganda against the Jews and the goyim," Hernandez said, explaining the break.
Shimon Aisenbach of the Chabad Canadian Friends of Cuban Jewry said that the falling-out was caused when the synagogue's old president left. Lubavitch emissaries, according to Aisenbach, were told that the synagogue no longer believed in the Orthodox definition of someone who is Jewish, which requires matrilineal descent.
"They proved it clearly to our emissaries by allowing an outright non-Jew to blow the shofar on that Rosh Hashanah," he explained in an email to the Forward.
Hernandez said that the synagogue is strictly Orthodox and does not do conversions, though it does allow those who have converted in the Patronato synagogue to take part in its services.
For most Cubans, though, conversions and intermarriages seem a part of life. Rosa Behar (no relation to the anthropologist), a prominent, retired gastroenterologist who runs a free pharmacy for the Jewish community and serves as president of the Cuban chapter of Hadassah, called them the "most beautiful thing" about the Jewish community.
"They come because life is better," she said, referring to the many assimilated Cubans with some Jewish ancestry who flock to synagogue services.
Cuba's hostile foreign policy toward Israel is largely typical of leftist governments worldwide. But there are low-profile chinks in the public stance. In 1992, Rafi Eitan, a former senior Mossad operative and current Israeli Cabinet minister, founded a company that owns several large citrus cooperatives in the country. He markets the cooperative's fruits in Israel. Eitan, who was implicated in Jonathan Pollard's Washington espionage scandal in the 1980s, has a personal relationship with Fidel Castro through his company. In 2006, Eitan joined Castro to inaugurate Havana's Holocaust memorial monument — a large seven-branch menorah in a central city square.
"The Cuban government doesn't like the Israeli government and their attitude toward the Palestinians, but they actually love Jewish people and appreciate the Jews," Ruth Behar said.
Arturo Lopez-Levy, a lecturer at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver who lived in Cuba until 2001, said he believed that Gross was an unwitting instrument of the old U.S. policy of regime change dressed as Jewish solidarity. At Gross's closed trial, Lopez-Levy related, citing accounts he heard from Cuba, a Jewish communal leader testified that Gross, who entered on a tourist visa, had never informed the Jewish communal official he was working on behalf of USAID. The Cuban government views USAID's Cuba programs, funded under Congress' Helms-Burton Act imposing sanctions on their country, as part of a U.S. effort to undermine the regime.
"It is legitimate to promote human rights, legitimate to promote religious freedom, legitimate to promote communications with Cuban citizens [to] the outside world," said Lopez-Levy, who strongly supports Gross's release. "What is not legitimate is to do so as an agent of a government that seeks to undermine the regime without the informed consent of the community."
Cuba’s booming private restaurants cause "bread crisis"
Cuba's booming private restaurants cause "bread crisis"English.news.cn 2011-03-22 14:17:48
HAVANA, March 21 (Xinhua) — Cuba's rapidly growing number of small private restaurants has forced the government to reorganize private bread production, a state-run daily necessity in Cuba, Cuban daily Granma said Monday.
"The discrepancy between bread supply and demand in the country is exacerbated by the growing demand from private food processors who have acquired self-employment licenses in recent months," the newspaper said.
Bread in Cuba is sold only in state-run stores, and the supply is now considered "insufficient" to meet the demand of the Cubans, as demands from an increasing number of private restaurants and fast food outlets are making the "bread crisis" worse.
From March 1 to date, Cuban authorities estimated that in Havana alone, up to 9,779 people have opened private restaurants and cafes.
"Clearly the only solution is to increase the production to meet all requirements," the newspaper said, adding the bread supply on the island is still "complex."
Every Cuban has the right to acquire one loaf of bread per day at a subsidized price through a food rationing program, but in recent years the government has also opened up establishments where bread is sold freely in Cuban pesos, together with shops and candy stores that sell goods and food in foreign currencies.
Cuba's state-owned bread company Cadena Cubana del Pan reported an increase in daily bread production from 25 tons in 2010 to 33 tons, while the demand this year is expected to grow by 52 percent.
The new production plan is "insufficient," and to meet the growing demand it is necessary to "rescue" the capability of the bakeries to make their own bread, the company's director Gloria Rodriguez said.
The Cuban authorities said they will make sure all measures are taken to meet the growing demand for bread.
Cuban leader Raul Castro recently announced that the ruling Communist Party will hold its first congress since 1997 in the second half of April, and the reform of Cuba's economic model will be the central theme of the congress. The Cuban government currently controls 85 percent of the island's economy.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/indepth/2011-03/22/c_13792143.htm
Cuba to import in 2011 twice the rice it produces
Cuba to import in 2011 twice the rice it producesPublished December 13, 2010EFE
Havana – The Cuban government will have to import in 2011 double the amount of rice it produces in order to meet domestic demand, the official weekly Trabajadores said Monday, citing the island's deputy minister of agriculture.
"Again in 2011 the country will have to import almost double the rice produced here," Juan Perez Lamas said at a meeting with growers, according to the publication of Cuba's only legal trade union, the CTC.
Cuba needs "more people growing rice and selling it though various channels, but with discipline," Perez Lamas said.
For its part, Trabajadores slammed the fact that a lack of resources, general disorganization, and apathy toward such options as cutting by hand, have caused "regrettable losses" in the rice fields.
"We're left with the impression that rice production goes at a faster pace than the development of a national infrastructure to sustain it," the weekly said.
In that sense, the publication said that there are problems with machinery like tractors, mills and dryers, and a "poorly maintained network of canals between reservoirs and plantations" that loses half the water meant for crops.
"Cuba now spends on producing the grain seven times more than Vietnam," Trabajadores said, while stressing the importance of "better planning."
It also said that in the new context of economic adjustments being planned by the Raul Castro government, "it would be healthy to explain to the grower just how much the government can promise him."
"It's absurd and anti-economic that we can't come up with the $250 that it costs to produce a ton of rice here when it's needed, but we can find the $500 it costs to bring it from Asia," the weekly publication said.
In 2009, the Agriculture Ministry's Rice Program launched a state plan aimed at substituting 29 percent of imports that year and to reach 56 percent by 2013.
According to the state corporation Alimport, Cuba spent in 2009 more than $2 billion on rice imports to guarantee supplies for the population.
According to official figures, the 11.2 million Cubans consume an average of 11 pounds of rice per month, for an annual consumption of more than 600,000 tons.
State-issued rationing cards guarantee each Cuban citizen 7 pounds of rice per month at subsidized prices.
http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/money/2010/12/13/cuba-import-twice-rice-produces/
Havana frees up markets — with a caveat
Posted on Tuesday, 11.09.1Havana frees up markets — with a caveatBY JUAN O. TAMAYOjtamayo@ElNuevoHerald.com
The Cuban Communist Party's guidelines for its next congress say central planning, not market forces, will rule the economy.
Cuban guidelines
These are key points in a document published Tuesday to frame the debate leading up to the VI Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba:
Cuba should expand “new forms of non-state enterprise'' such as self-employment, cooperatives, leases of public lands to private farmers and rents of state-owned shops, such as bakeries, to their employees.
The new private enterprises should have access to government-run wholesalers, where they can buy supplies at moderate prices, and to bank credits so they can grow their businesses.
The government should scale back its “current burden of controls'' on state enterprises to allow them to become more efficient, but shut down those that don't improve sufficiently.
Income and other taxes and fees should rise according to revenue and will be expanded “to help ameliorate inequalities among the citizens.''
Tourism will be increased through foreign investments in golf resorts and marinas and housing developments surrounding them.
The government should unify the two official currencies, the peso and the CUC.
The food ration card should be slowly eliminated to reduce government subsidies.
Article:
Cuba's food rationing card will be eliminated. Private economic activity and foreign investments will be allowed to expand, and the government will reduce controls of agriculture and state enterprises.
But communist-styled centralized planning, and not capitalist market forces, will guide the future of Cuba where “only socialism is capable of . . . preserving the gains of the revolution.''
That's part of the take-away from a 32-page document published Tuesday as a guide for the grass-roots debate that will lead up to the first Congress since 1997 of the Communist Party of Cuba in April.
Cuban ruler Raúl Castro already has launched many of the changes proposed in the document — warning that a withering economic crisis is pushing Cuba to the edge of a “precipice'' — and the Congress is expected to give them its official seal of approval.
The Congress in April “will be more about preserving the system and the party, not about announcing change,'' said Irving Louis Horowitz, who has co-edited a dozen volumes of the academic journal Cuban Communism. “It's important to the nation and the party only because there are no other parties.''
But the gathering may well be the last for the generation that has held power since the Cuban revolution in 1959. Castro, 79, succeeded his ailing brother Fidel, 84, in 2008.
The Communist Party is required to hold congresses every five years to set mayor policy directions, but it has not held one in 13 years as the island struggled through hard economic times and later the Castro leadership change.
The guidance document, sold on street stands Tuesday for one peso (about three U.S. cents), makes it clear the party will not abandon the Marxist-Leninist ideology that Fidel Castro put in place.
`THE PRINCIPLE'
Cuba's economic future “will be in accordance with the principle that only socialism can overcome difficulties and preserve the gains of the revolution, and that in the updating of the economic model, [central] planning will be paramount, not the market,'' it declares.
Titled Project for Guidance on the Economic and Social Policy, the document ticks off a long string of proposals for jump-starting an economy mired by low productivity, dismal wages centralized planning and the theft of state resources.
Among the changes already started or proposed by Raúl Castro are an expansion of private economic activity, such as self-employment and cooperatives, and encouragement of foreign investments and tourism.
The guide added that Cuba should assure “the strict fulfillment of contract commitments,'' referring to the 2009 decision to freeze foreign assets in Cuban banks and halt payments on some foreign debts.
The government also should move toward the unification of Cuba's two currencies — pesos used to pay salaries and CUCs (worth about 28 pesos) that are needed to buy most imported goods. But such a move is complex and will need “rigorous preparation,'' the document noted.
The ration card, which provides 10 days' worth of food per month at dirt-cheap prices, will be “eliminated in an orderly fashion'' as part of the campaign to cut back massive government subsidies, the guide said.
Also for the first time, the guide broached the possibility of opening up the real estate market, which is now tightly controlled by the government. But it warned that “the concentration of properties'' won't be allowed.
Castro said the guidelines were submitted before publication to Fidel, who is first secretary of the Communist Party, while he remains second secretary.
The Communist Party, which has 820,000 by-invitation-only members in a country of 11.2 million people, is described in the constitution as “the superior directing force of society and the state.''
During his announcement Monday that the Congress would be held in April, Castro said the party will hold seminars later this month to teach its officials how they can “guide the massive discussion.''
The debates will take place from Dec. 1 until the end of February, he said, and the party will gather the opinions and present them to the Congress in the last half of April.
Castro announced in early 2008 that the congress would be held in the last half of 2009.
But in July of 2009 he postponed it indefinitely because of the economic crisis.
The island imports an estimated 60 to 80 percent of all its food and the average monthly salary stands at $20, not enough to make ends meet despite free healthcare and education.
PAST CONGRESSES
The IV Communist Party Congress in 1991 began with similar calls for a grass-roots debate on Cuba's future, but the debate was abruptly cut short amid an outburst of complaints against the system. The debate that preceded the V Congress in 1997 was much more controlled.
In 2007, Castro urged Cubans to express themselves “with valor, with sincerity'' after he delivered a brutally frank diagnosis of Cuba's economic ailments during a speech that July.
The speech was debated in neighborhoods, schools and work places throughout Cuba and more than one million comments were gathered, according to government announcements. It's not clear clear what happened to them.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/11/09/v-fullstory/1917879/havana-frees-up-markets-with-a.html
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