One
Sunday last summer, 18-year-old Eloy Cardoso left his mother’s house on the
outskirts of Havana to collect an Atari game console from a friend. He’d stayed at home the previous day, while
the largest anti-government demonstrations since the
revolution had ripped through Cuba.
The authorities had managed to quell the protests in most of the country overnight, but not in La Güinera: unrest was still raging in the humble and normally calm neighbourhood, and Eloy walked out into a bloody brawl. Shops were smashed and looted, party supporters wielded clubs, police wrestled with youths, and one man was shot dead. Amid the tumult, Cardoso began to throw stones at the police.
He was
arrested a few days later, and at a closed trial earlier this week he was
sentenced to seven years in prison. The
trial is one of scores currently playing out across the island, as, six months
after the demonstrations, Cuban courts have quietly started imposing draconian
sentences on the protesters who – sometimes peacefully, sometimes less so –
flooded the streets last summer.
Though
the state has a history of issuing stiff sentences to organised political
dissidents, the punishments now being meted out are unusually severe.
“They
want to make an example of him,” said Cardoso’s mother, Servillia Pedroso, 35,
holding back tears. Eloy Cardoso’s
mother, Servillia Pedroso, left, and Migdalia Gutiérrez, whose son, Brunelvil,
has been sentenced to 15 years.
Because
her son is at college, police initially told her he would get a “second chance”
charging him with “public disorder” and telling him he would get away with a
fine. But in October, the charge was
upgraded to sedition: in other words, inciting others to rebel against state
authority.
Since
December, more 50 people in La Güinera have been sentenced for sedition,
according to the civil society organisation Justicia
11J. Most are poor, young males.
Justicia 11J said more than 700 people were still being detained
following July’s protests, with 158 of those accused of or already sentenced
for sedition. Last week one man in the eastern province of Holguín was
sentenced to 30 years.
Erika
Guevara-Rosas, Americas director at Amnesty International, said
detainees have faced summary proceedings without guarantees of due process or a
fair trial. “Prosecutors have pushed for
disproportionately long sentences against people who were arrested in the
protests. In addition, many people stand accused of vague crimes that are
inconsistent with international standards, such as ‘contempt’ which has been
consistently used in Cuba to punish those who criticise the government,” she
said.
“The
state is trying to send the message that there are dire consequences to
rebelling against the government,” said William LeoGrande, professor of
government at American University in Washington. “The fact that the government feels under and
is under unprecedented threat – not just from increased US sanctions but from
the pandemic and the global economic situation – makes it less willing to
tolerate any type of dissidence.”
Trump-era
sanctions contributed to the food and medicine shortages people were
protesting against. The sanctions also slowed vaccine production, aggravating a Covid
surge that was sweeping through the island at the time, and contributing to the
fury. But many protesters also wanted freedom from Communist rule.
Economic
complaints are a constant in La Güinera: it’s hard to afford shoes and
medicine. A schoolbag costs 2,500 pesos – more than half a teacher’s monthly
salary.
“I’m sure
that if it wasn’t for the economy, none of this would have happened – but the
economy never improves,” said Yusniel Hernández, 36, a teacher turned taxi
driver, who said a dozen friends had been incarcerated for throwing stones and
assaulting police officers.
Analysts
say the government is using exemplary sentencing to snuff out any further
protests because it is bracing for further economic hardship. As sanctions have
hardened, a longstanding siege mentality among the leadership seems to have
ossified in recent years. The fact that the Biden administration reversed its policy of normalisation with the
island after July may be another contributing factor.
But the
pain from the crackdown is palpable. “None
of these kids were activists, they don’t belong to any organisation,” said
Migdalia Gutiérrez, 44, whose son, Brunelvil, 33, has been sentenced to 15
years. If someone has nothing to do with
politics, and you are accusing them of political stuff, then you are making
them political prisoners,” she added.
Her
nextdoor neighbour, María Luisa Fleitas Bravo, 58, lives in poverty. The roof
of her kitchen, living room and second bedroom collapsed when Hurricane Irma
struck in 2017. The state provided her with the breeze-blocks she needed to
rebuild, but four years later the cement still hasn’t arrived. Her rotting wood ceiling is covered with
plastic sheets secured by clothes pegs, but it still leaks when it rains. Her unemployed 33-year-old son, Rolando, was
sentenced to 21 years for attacking a police officer during the protests (a
charge he denies).
Pedroso has
been running a small online campaign to free her son. But shortly after she and
seven other local mothers made a video demanding justice , she received a visit
from the police, who informed her that the video was being shared on Facebook
for “counterrevolutionary” ends.
She has
since been questioned by state security, and told that if she takes to the
street to protest for her son’s release, she could be charged with public
disorder.
Pedroso,
a housewife, had applied for a job at Havana’s international airport, to work
in immigration. The job was all but in the bag, she said, until she was asked
about her son during a final check-up interview. That was September. She hasn’t heard back
since.
“Nobody
who has a child accused of anything can work in the airport,” she said, before
adding, with a touch of gallows humour: “In fact, yes: they can be accused of
murder, but not of counterrevolution.”
After protests swept the whole country in July, the Cuban government has started taking measures to contain the fallout. While this response goes beyond the regime’s initial repression, it hasn’t yet entirely left that path. If the country’s leadership wants to survive this test, it has no choice but to respond to citizens’ legitimate demands.
Whether
one may like it or not, the events of 11 July 2021 will have an effect on how
Cubans themselves and their country. For most of the population, it was a sad
day – and most people would rather not remember the sad days. But it cannot be
ignored. At present, information about what actually happened is still patchy;
it is difficult to navigate between fake news and the official versions of
events.
What has
been established is that, on Sunday 11July, there were widespread
anti-government protests, some of which ended in violence – and this had never
happened before in Cuba. As such, many observers and indeed the authorities
themselves were surprised. The result was images of violence and a situation
which had escalated out of control. Whatever the details, this is objectively
damaging for the Cuban government: and even if, as looks unlikely, the
situation settles back down, the reputational damage will last.
NOT A SURPRISE
Actually,
the Cuban government shouldn’t have been surprised by the course of events –
this being the same government that had for months been talking up the
possibility of a ‘soft coup’ or a ‘colour revolution’ planned across the water
by its arch-enemy, the US. Perhaps it was the surprise of something actually
happening that led the government to clamp down so repressively, while pursuing
the same endless propaganda communication strategy as ever despite its
demonstrably diminishing returns.
It’s
equally surprising that this unrest did not surface much earlier, considering
the privations to which the Cuban population has long been subject and which
have been further worsened by the pandemic.
Thanks to
the social progress of the early years and Cuba’s international high profile,
unrest in the country was staved off.
Now, the
unrest is here – and its effect is palpable. Just three months after the Eighth
Congress of the Communist Party and two years after establishing a new
constitution, the new Cuban leadership finds itself in crisis. A crisis that,
in many ways, evokes the situation in the socialist countries of eastern Europe
just prior to their collapse.
CUBA’S EARLY ACHIEVEMENTS
There
are, however, several differences. Cuba is a third-world country which, after
years of neo-colonial suppression, liberated itself by means of a national
revolution. As the result of an aggressive confrontation with Washington, this
revolution became increasingly radical – and was initially successful, too, in
its goal of halting the advance of US imperialism. The result was a socialist
model that because of an alliance with the Soviet Union offered considerable
advantages for at least the next three decades.
Thanks to
the social progress of the early years and Cuba’s international high profile,
unrest in the country was staved off. Essentially, the fact that the socialist
regime not only survived a direct confrontation with the US but went on to
become a unique actor on the world stage – not only during the Cold War, but
beyond – conferred considerable credit on the government and allowed it freedom
of manoeuvre in domestic issues.
These
achievements and successes are without doubt the foundation of Cuban regime’s
resilience and its people’s stoicism in the face of lasting and quite
extraordinary difficulties. Yet while these difficulties certainly are caused
by the US embargo, they are in no small part also the result of governmental
inadequacy and poor policy. When it comes to the role of the country’s
political opposition, the situation is similar. Certainly, some groups are
being supported from the US with a view to subverting the Cuban regime.
THE DOMESTIC OPPOSITION
Yet
during the unrest, the activists with US support were less visible than those
of the country’s domestic Movimiento San Isidro and 27N groupings. Then again,
there is no doubt about the fact that protests were encouraged on social media
– to no small degree by political influencers who do not live in Cuba, but
rather mainly in Miami, where militant anti-Castro activism remains an
important local industry financed from a range of state and non-state sources.
In Cuban national reality, social media has become a toxic element as millions
of dollars are pumped into fake-news campaigns aiming to destabilise the
regime.
Even if,
however, the trigger came from outside, unrest would not have flared up if it
had, inside Cuba, not found fertile ground prepared by numerous political
mistakes on the part of the government. Here, a range of factors played a role:
in the poorest urban areas, conditions had worsened considerably; overall, food
supply had become increasingly erratic; and after a successful start in
combating the pandemic, the situation in healthcare was becoming unstable.
The
government reacted by proclaiming that ‘the embargo is the problem’ and talking
down the protests as ‘interference from outside’ in an effort to cover up its
own errors. What the regime has underestimated is the dissatisfaction that this
mantra now provokes. Certainly, the sanctions upheld against Cuba by the US for
almost 60 years now represent, to paraphrase US historian Peter Beinart, a kind
of economic war against a country under siege. Beinart is right to criticise
the embargo as a non-military act of war – and one which, given that the stated
aim has always been regime change, has never had much prospect of success. And
while Washington refutes Cuban accusations, it is a simple matter of fact that
Joe Biden has maintained sanctions imposed by Donald Trump even as the pandemic
has continued to rage.
Continuing
to place all the blame on external factors without any real introspection in
respect of home-grown issues would be a grave mistake.
Yes, for
more than six months now, the Biden Administration has failed to make good on
its manifesto promise and remains locked in the Trumpian version of Republican
Party logic vis-à-vis Cuba policy – the illusion that ever more extreme
sanctions will eventually succeed in dislodging the regime which came to power
in 1959. So this much seems likely: sanctions against Cuba will remain in place
for the next three years; Cubans will get even poorer; the Cuban government will
continue to be bullied.
THE CUBAN GOVERNMENT NEEDS A RETHINK
In view of this, Havana is currently trying to contain the fallout. Yet the regime needs to examine the political and social situation – and grasp that only economic policy focusing on efficiency and activating domestic productive capacity can get the country out of the current crisis. Continuing to place all the blame on external factors without any real introspection in respect of home-grown issues would be a grave mistake. The reforms the government has promised, especially in respect of food distribution, need to be enacted – fast.
The issue
of how to deal with the figureheads of the protests adds another layer of
complexity to the situation. The government cannot allow the impression to develop
that, either at home or abroad, it is cracking down hard on peaceful
demonstrations. Yet currently, there are rumours about summary justice and
questionable court proceedings leading to sentences of ten to twelve months for
people who, in many cases, do not seem to have been involved in any acts of
violence. This comes for Cubans who have only recently had the important
experience of debating and then approving a new constitution in which the
importance of fair trials is underscored. Now more than ever, citizens are
demanding nothing more – and nothing less – than that the police act within the
law.
The Cuban
government, too, needs to rethink how it works. As its population is
increasingly deaf to the argument that the embargo is the root of all evil, it
needs to make a serious attempt to overcome two key political-ideological
obstacles in its way. Firstly, there is the outdated approach to socialism as a
system primarily steered from central planning bureaus; this dogmatic dirigisme
reduces the role of the market in distributing resources to a minimum – with
all the attendant problems. Secondly, the regime needs to distance itself from
an idea of socialism as an authoritarian model that can ignore or even
criminalise those whose criticism is intended to make the country’s economy
more efficient and its society more democratic, to see its 2019 constitution
enacted and establish the rule of law.
A WHOLE NEW MOMENT FOR CUBA
Yet the
regime’s reaction to the events of 11 July as communicated official media channels
showed no signs of overcoming this tendency. Those who took part in the
protests have been discredited and decried as criminal elements – overlooking
the specific and legitimate demands made by many in a peaceful manner. This may
come back to haunt the regime.
These
demonstrations represent a wholly new development for Cuba and make clear just
what difficulties the country’s society is facing.
Furthermore, official announcements have sought to justify the use of repressive violence – a message with which many Cubans who, while not directly involved, have observed (and been shocked by) events, strongly disagree. Internationally, Cuba’s image has taken a hit. There is still no clarity about the number of demonstrations or how they played out, how many took part, and how many participants have been placed under arrest. Meanwhile, intellectuals and artists have publicly denounced the regime’s repressive course, with many demanding the release of all peaceful protestors – including such figures as songwriter Silvio Rodríguez, who enjoys a great deal of respect among many in government.
The lack
of genuine information is leaving space for disinformation to circulate around
both external actors and the country’s population – disinformation spread with
the aim of undermining the government. At the same time, Cuban citizens have
broadly accepted the precept that peaceful protests are legitimate and should
be protected under law. This is a precept with which the government, however,
in clear contravention of the principal of a socialist country under the rule
of law, does not agree. This is not sending the right message – neither on a
domestic nor international level.
These
demonstrations represent a wholly new development for Cuba and make clear just
what difficulties the country’s society is facing. These difficulties have been
further aggravated by a US embargo which continues to impoverish the Cuban
population and exert pressure on the country’s government. The current
situation represents a stress-test for the Cuban regime, which would do well to
remember that, when faced with similar situations, like-minded politicians had
more success when they decided to pursue a path of generosity and listen to
citizens’ legitimate concerns rather than leaving demands to fall on deaf ears.
The
Spanish version of this article appeared in Nueva Sociedad.
With the
world watching as Cubans protested on the streets all over the island on July
11, Cuban leader Miguel Díaz-Canel took what some experts believe was a
decision that will come back to haunt him: He gave a “combat order” to fellow
revolutionaries to squash those calling for freedom and the “end of the
dictatorship.”
In the
aftermath of images of police repression and pro-government mobs hitting
protesters with clubs going viral, there has been a rare wave of criticism from
government insiders, state journalists, and prominent figures in the arts,
pointing to a crisis of governance in the communist island that no other leader
has faced in six decades.
Diaz-Canel
recently told journalists working for state-sanctioned outlets that he doesn’t
regret the order to crack down on anti-government demonstrators. But the fact
that he felt the need to gather the journalists at a meeting Saturday to
justify his decision is the latest example of a damage-control campaign to
restore his dwindling popularity and political standing.
“I made a
call to the people that day because it seemed to me that it was the right thing
to do and that I do not regret or will not regret,” he said in a video of the
meeting that was later edited and televised this week. “We had to defend
against demonstrations that were not peaceful at all. And that is a false story
that they have also put out there.”
But even
in the controlled setting of the Palace of the Revolution, and among some of
his more staunch defenders, he could not avoid criticism.
A young
journalist who works on Editorial de la Mujer, or Women’s Publishing, stood up
and told him that political troubles call for “political solutions… not only,
or not police actions.”
“President,
you acknowledged that apologies should be given wherever an excess was
committed,” said Lirians Gordillo. “We also need to tell those stories because
nothing can harm this country more than an injustice or an excess that is not recognized
out loud.”
A day
after his controversial statement on July 11, Diaz-Canel appeared on television
to walk back his words and strike a more conciliatory tone. But a month later,
his “combat order” and the violent repression that followed, including hundreds of documented detentions
and summary trials, are still
causing him trouble.
Sweating
despite the air conditioning at the Palace of the Revolution and stumbling over
his words a couple of times, the leader acknowledged Saturday that there might
have been “some excesses.” He said those cases would be investigated but denied
that there are protesters who are “disappeared or have been tortured.”
Amnesty
International, Human Rights Watch and Cubalex, all human-rights organizations
tracking the arrests, have documented cases of mistreatment and protesters
whose whereabouts are still unknown.
“Díaz-Canel
has lost all credibility,” said a source close to the Cuban government who
asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation. “That day he appeared on TV
and said what he said, all hopes among the younger generations that he would be
a reformer were destroyed in 20 minutes. And from then on, he has continued to
screw up.”
Shortly
after images of the violence spread on social media, prominent Cuban musicians
and other members of the island’s artistic community, including Leo Brouwer,
Adalberto Alvarez, Elito Reve and members of the legendary band Los Van Van,
posted candid criticism on social media.
Brouwer
said he never imagined that security forces would attack peaceful Cubans.
“Impossible
to be silent,” said Alvarez. “The beatings and the images I see of the violence
against a people that took to the streets to peacefully express what they feel
hurt me.”
“The
streets in Cuba belong to the Cubans. I can not do less than be by your side in
difficult times,” he wrote on Facebook.
In a
stunning rebuke of Díaz-Canel’s response to the crisis, a former Cuban
ambassador who frequently defends the government’s views on foreign media said
Cuban authorities could not ignore its citizens’ legitimate demands.
Carlos
Alzugaray, a former ambassador to the European Union, wrote an opinion column
criticizing the government’s “clampdown” on protesters “so repressively, while
pursuing the same endless propaganda communication strategy as ever despite its
demonstrably diminishing returns.”
While he
repeated the government line that the U.S. embargo is the source of Cuba’s
economic troubles, he added they were “in no small part also the result of
governmental inadequacy and poor policy.” And, he added, the Cuban government
was “proclaiming that ‘the embargo is the problem’ and talking down the
protests as ‘interference from outside’ in an effort to cover up its own
errors.”
The
message, however, does not appear to be getting through at the top levels of
the Cuban government.
Last
week, the government published a draconian law to
criminalize expressing dissenting opinions on the internet. Diaz-Canel seems to
be on a personal crusade against social media, which he called a “colonial
tool” that promotes hate.
The Cuban
leader has not been treated kindly by his fellow Cubans on social media, where
he is constantly derided, when not made the butt of jokes and memes. A vulgar
insult repeated by thousands of people during the demonstrations has now become
attached to his name on Google search.
After
Raúl Castro picked him to succeed him in 2018, Diaz-Canel has faced one crisis
after another. Widespread shortages and blackouts, and controversial decisions
like selling food in U.S. dollars that the population does not earn, have made
him an unpopular figure and the target of the demonstrators’ anger.
From the
beginning, his position has been tenuous. As a non-Castro, he doesn’t have the
credibility of the so called históricos, those who fought for the
revolution in the 1950s in the Sierra Maestra mountains. But he still needs to
cater to Communist Party hardliners. And he is expected to carry out
long-delayed reforms like the currency unification that has angered ordinary
Cubans even more.
“He might
as well become a one-term president, since he was left all the ugly stuff to
make the country survivable” in financial terms, said John Kavulich, the
president of the US-Cuba Trade and Economic Council.
Still,
Diaz-Canel was named the Party’s First Secretary in April this year, after Raul
Castro’s official retirement, a powerful position he could have used to stop
the repression of protesters “if he had the will,” the source close to the
island’s government said.
The
protests calling for “Fatherland and Life” in Cuba have been met with military
tanks and censorship by the Cuban government. U-M sociologist Silvia Pedraza says the protests are the
result of a perfect storm that includes the coronavirus pandemic, the lack of a
charismatic leader, the deep financial crisis unleashed by changes in the
currency, and greater access to the internet in recent years.
Originally from Cuba, Pedraza seeks to understand the causes and consequences of immigration as a historical process that forms and transforms nations. A professor of sociology and American culture, she is the author of several books, including Political Disaffection in Cuba’s Revolution and Exodus (Cambridge University Press, 2007) and co-author of the forthcoming Revolutions in Cuba and Venezuela: One Hope, Two Realities (University of Florida Press, under contract).
Dr. Silvia Pedraza
What is
“Patria y Vida” and why is it relevant to the protests?
Current
protests in Cuba are calling for “Patria y Vida” (Fatherland and Life), the
title of a recent rap song by young, Afro-Cuban dissident artists, that has
become the banner of the protest movement. The song was created by rappers both
on the island and in Miami — Luis Manuel Otero-Alcántara, Maykel Osorbo and
Yotuel, among others. It takes off from Fidel Castro’s motto of “Patria o
Muerte” (Fatherland or Death), insisting that the Cuban government should
provide its citizens with a decent life and liberty, as has been denied for
over 60 years. This song is a continuation of the San Isidro movement that
erupted last Nov. 27, 2020, when hundreds of artists and other mostly young
people sat in front of the Ministry of Culture for days, demanding a real
dialogue with the Cuban government and real participation in the country’s
political life. President Miguel Díaz-Canel denied them both, calling the
dissenters “mercenaries” and blaming the protests on the U.S. embargo. Now the
protests of thousands of people in many cities across the full length of the
island are being met with military tanks and repression as the government
insists “the revolution” must be preserved.
What has
led to the current protests in Cuba?
We are
seeing a number of completely different factors that have come together,
creating a perfect storm. One of these factors is certainly the continuation of
the U.S. embargo, but that is an old ingredient Cubans have adjusted to, so it
can’t be said to be the cause of what is happening right now.
In
January 2021, Cuba underwent a drastic reform of its financial life as it did
away with the old currency it imposed many years ago, the CUC, and returned to
the old Cuban peso overnight. The result was a spiraling inflation of prices
that left Cubans unable to buy food or medicine, when they were hungry and ill.
In the last decade, the Cuban economy has declined steeply, contracting by -11%
GDP growth last year. At present, Cuba imports food and exports little. The
pillars of Cuba’s economy are international tourism, Venezuela’s oil, and
remittances from the émigrés. Recently, all three have declined to the point
where they no longer hold up the island’s economy.
Before, events where the people
rebelled against the government happened in different parts of Havana, for
example, but nobody else knew what had happened so it never triggered a
collective response. Now, we see that knowledge of what others are doing is
widely shared and it has triggered a collective response. As a result, the
Cuban government cut off the internet for some days.
The new
ability that Cubans found in the last three years or so to get onto the
internet, to see how the rest of the world lives, and to communicate among
themselves with ease (none of which was ever possible before), is quite an important
ingredient. Before, events where the people rebelled against the government
happened in different parts of Havana, for example, but nobody else knew what
had happened so it never triggered a collective response. Now, we see that
knowledge of what others are doing is widely shared and it has triggered a
collective response. As a result, the Cuban government cut off the internet for
some days.
Former
President Trump also left in place some sanctions that have made a difference.
For example, Trump did away with Western Union offices in Cuba. Now Cubans who
live in poverty inside the island can no longer rely on the help from their
family in Miami, throughout the United States, in Latin America, and Spain.
Until just a few months ago, the family overseas sent money, clothing,
medicines, and food. Now, Cubans whose lives are very precarious cannot rely on
their family abroad to buoy them up.
The
pandemic also has made a difference. The impact the coronavirus has had on
society has been profound — not only in Cuba but also in the United States,
India, and Brazil. Not only has it killed many people, but people can see the
government’s lack of capacity to deal with a very serious problem. The problem
has not gotten better but has gotten much worse to the detriment of everybody
in the population. Thus, no one believes that the government can be counted on
to really help them.
The Cuban people are tired of
communism — so many beautiful promises, so little delivered. I honestly believe
that we are possibly seeing the beginning of a revolution in Cuba, another
revolution after 62 years.So all of these things have come together and there
is a perfect storm going on in Cuba. It could end in a massive exodus, but I am
not expecting it to. People are not saying, “I want to leave this country and
get out of here and make a new life somewhere else.” What they are saying
is, “We want a different government. We want real democracy in this
country. This is our nation. This is our fatherland. This is our motherland.
Look at the signs people are holding up, saying: ‘Patria y Vida.’ Listen to
what they are shouting: ‘Libertad (Freedom).’”
This
could be the beginning of another Cuban revolution because it is not just about
economics or just about the exodus. Now, it is about the political structure of
the country. The problem is the government, which is not responsible to its
citizens. The Cuban people are tired of communism — so many beautiful promises,
so little delivered. I honestly believe that we are possibly seeing the beginning
of a revolution in Cuba, another revolution after 62 years.
What
other factors have influenced this wave of protests that we have seen in Cuba?
When the
communist world collapsed in the early 1990s and something similar happened,
when the economy contracted by -35% of GDP in three years and Cubans
experienced great hunger, Fidel Castro, with his great skill and charisma and
“lip service,” as they say in Cuba, called it “a special period” during a time
of peace. People don’t want to experience this twice.
Donald Trump did away with
Western Union offices in Cuba. Now Cubans who live in poverty inside the island
can no longer rely on the help from their family in Miami, throughout the
United States, in Latin America, and Spain. Until just a few months ago, the
family overseas sent money, clothing, medicines, and food. Now, Cubans whose
lives are very precarious cannot rely on their family abroad to buoy them up.
Second, Fidel Castro, with his charisma and oratory skills, is not there. Raúl
Castro is already very old and never had that charisma, though he did usher in
some good reforms for the people. And Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel is not
a leader who has reached the minds or hearts of the people, and I do not think
he has much administrative capacity either because it is already seen that his
response to the protests has been repression.
Social
scientists often wish they could separate the impact of one variable from
another in predicting a particular outcome, so we could say that this was due
to the currency exchange or to Trump’s sanctions or to the coronavirus or to
the dwindling help from Venezuela. But the reality is that it is due to all of
this having come together, in a historically contingent manner.
What has
been the contribution of the U.S. embargo to the crisis?
The
embargo has been eased since 2000, when Congress voted to do so, given the
tragedy of family separation that took place around the small boy, Elián
González, the youngest balserito (rafter) to be rescued at sea. Since then, the
U.S. is a major trading partner for Cuba. The United States sells cereals and
grains to Cuba, from the Western states. It sells chickens from the Carolinas
and turkeys from Michigan and some medicines.
Trump imposed very strong
sanctions against Cuba. President Biden could have easily removed them, but he
hasn’t. New Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that neither Cuba nor
Venezuela was a priority for the administration. It is up to Congress to ease
the embargo further, and I think they should, as it has not been able to topple
the Cuban revolution but has, rather, been counterproductive. One can see
Cuba’s president now blaming all that is happening on the embargo — as they
have consistently done. That is what counterproductive means. The Cuban
government is going to try to blame everything on the United States embargo,
but it is no worse now than before. More serious is that Donald Trump destroyed
the ability of the Cuban exile to help their family on the island, to keep them
afloat.
Trump
imposed very strong sanctions against Cuba. President Biden could have easily
removed them, but he hasn’t. New Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that
neither Cuba nor Venezuela was a priority for the administration. So if
anything will result from these protests, it is that they may well make Cuba,
and perhaps Venezuela, a priority for Biden. I hope so.
he street demonstrations that broke out all over Cuba on July 11 are an unprecedented event in the more than 60 years since the triumph of the Cuban Revolution.
But why now? This essay explores the historic, economic and political factors
that help to clarify the causes of Cuba’s July 11,
considers the role of the United States, and briefly reflects on
Cuba’s future.
On Sunday, July 11, Cuba erupted in street
protests. Unlike the major street protest that took place in 1994 and was limited to the Malecón, the long multi-lane
Havana road facing the Gulf of Mexico, the July 11
outbreak of protest was national in scope. There were protests in many towns
and cities, including Santiago de Cuba in the east, Trinidad in the center of
the island, as well as Havana in the west. The growing access to social media
in the island played an important role in the rapid spread of the protests; no
wonder the government immediately suspended access to certain social media
sites and brought all telephone calls from abroad to a halt.
The street presence and participation of Black women and men was notable
everywhere. This should not be surprising since Black Cubans are far less
likely to receive hard currency remittances from abroad even though over 50% of the population receive some degree of financial
support through that channel. These remittances have become the key to survival
in Cuba, particularly in light of the ever-diminishing number of goods
available in the peso-denominated subsidized ration book. Cuban Blacks have also
been the victims of institutional racism in the growing tourist industry where
“front line” visible jobs are mostly reserved
for conventionally attractive white and light skinned women and men.
The demonstrators did not endorse or support any political program or
ideology, aside from the general demand for political freedom. The official
Cuban press claims that the demonstrations were organized from abroad by
right-wing Cubans. But none of the demands associated with the Cuban right-wing
were echoed by the demonstrators, like the support for Trump often heard in
South Florida and among some dissident circles in Cuba. And no one called for “humanitarian intervention” espoused by Plattistas
(Platt Amendment, approved by Congress in 1901and
abolished in 1934, gave the United States the right
to militarily intervene in Cuba), such as biologist Ariel Ruiz Urquiola,
himself a victim of government repression for his independent ecological
activism. The demonstrators did speak about the scarcity of food, medicine and
essential consumer items, repudiated President Díaz-Canel as singao—a
phrase that in Cuba translates as “fucked” but
means a wicked, evil person, and chanted patria y vida
(fatherland and life). “Patria y Vida” is
the title of a very popular and highly polished rap song by a group
of Cuban Black rappers (available on YouTube.) I have seen and heard the
song more than a dozen times to enjoy it as well as to search for its
explicit and implied meanings including in its silences and ambiguities.
“Patria y Vida” counterposes itself to the old
Cuban government slogan of “Patria
o Muerte” (“Fatherland or Death”). While that slogan may have made sense
in the 1960s when Cuba was faced with actual
invasions, it borders on the obscene when voiced by second generation
bureaucrats. It is certainly high time that the regime’s macho cult of violence
and death be challenged, and this song does it very well.
But what does it mean to implicitly repudiate the year 1959,
the first year of the successful revolution, as the song does? There was no
Soviet style system in Cuba at the time and the year 1959
is not equivalent to the Castro brothers. Many people of a wide variety of
political beliefs fought and died to bring about the revolution that overthrew
the Batista dictatorship. The song does express many important democratic
sentiments against the present Cuban dictatorship, but it is unfortunately
silent about the desirable alternative, which leaves room for the worst
right-wing, pro-Trump elements in South Florida to rally behind it as if it
was theirs.
True to form, President Díaz-Canel called on the “revolutionaries”
to be ready for combat and go out and reclaim the streets away from the
demonstrators. In fact, it was the uniformed police, Seguridad del Estado (the
secret police), and Boinas Negras (black berets, the special forces) that
responded with tear gas, beatings and hundreds of arrests, including several
leftist critics of the government. According to a July 21 Reuters report, the authorities had confirmed that they
had started the trials of the demonstrators accused of a variety of
charges, but denied it according to another press report on July 25. These are summary trials without the benefit of
defense counsel, a format generally used for minor violations in Cuba but
which in this case involves the possibility of years in prison for those
found guilty.
Most of the demonstrations were angry but usually peaceful and only in a few instances did the demonstrators behave violently, as in the case of some looting and a police car that was overturned. This was in clear contrast with the violence frequently displayed by the forces of order. It is worth noting that in calling his followers to take to the streets to combat the demonstrators, Díaz-Canel invoked the more than 60-year-old notion that “the streets belong to the revolutionaries.” Just as the government has always proclaimed that “the universities belong to the revolutionaries” in order to expel students and professors that don’t toe the government’s line. One example is René Fidel González García, a law professor expelled from the University of Oriente. He is a strong critic of government policies, who, far from giving up on his revolutionary ideals, has reaffirmed them on numerous occasions.
But Why Now?
Cuba is in the middle of the most serious economic crisis since the 1990s, when, as a result of the collapse of the
Soviet bloc, Cubans suffered innumerable and lengthy blackouts due to the
severe shortage of oil, along with endemic malnutrition with its accompanying
health problems.
The present economic crisis is due to the pandemic-related decline of
tourism, combined with the government’s long term capital disinvestment and
inability to maintain production, even at the lower levels of the last five years.
Cuba’s GDP (Gross Domestic Product) fell by 11% in 2020 and only rose by 0.5% in 2019, the year before the
pandemic broke out. The annual sugar crop that ended this spring did not even
reach 1 million tons, which is below the 1.4 million average of recent
years and very far below the 8 million tons in 1989. The recent government attempt to unify the various
currencies circulating in Cuba — primarily the CUC, a proxy for the
dollar, and the peso — has backfired resulting in serious inflation that was predicted
among others by the prominent Cuban economist Carmelo Mesa-Lago. While the CUC
is indeed disappearing, the Cuban economy has been virtually dollarized with
the constant decline of the value of the peso. While the official exchange rate
is 24 pesos to the dollar, the prevailing black
market rate is 60 pesos to the dollar, and it is
going to get worse due to the lack of tourist dollars. This turn to an ever
more expensive dollar, may be somewhat restrained in light of the government’s
recent shift to the euro as its preferred hard currency.
Worst of all, is the generalized shortage of food, even for those who have divisas,
the generic term for hard currencies. The agricultural reforms of the last
years aimed at increasing domestic production have not worked because they are
inadequate and insufficient, making it impossible for the private farmers and
for the usufructuarios (farmers who lease land from the government for
20 year terms renewable for another 20 years) to feed the country. Thus, for example, the
government arbitrarily gives bank credits to the farmers for some things but
not for others, like for clearing the marabú, an invasive weed that is
costly to remove, but an essential task if crops are to grow. Acopio, the
state agency in charge of collecting the substantial proportion of the crop
that farmers have to sell to the state at prices fixed by the government is
notoriously inefficient and wasteful, because the Acopio trucks do not
arrive in time to collect their share, or because of the systemic indifference
and carelessness that pervade the processes of shipping and storage. This
creates huge spoilage and waste that have reduced the quality and quantity of
goods available to consumers. It is for reasons such as these that Cuba imports
70% of the food it consumes from various countries
including the United States (an exemption to the blockade was carved out in 2001 for the unlimited export of food and medicines to
Cuba but with the serious limitation that Cuba has to pay in cash before the
goods are shipped to the island.)
The Cuban economist Pedro Monreal has called attention to the overwhelming
millions of pesos that the government has dedicated to the construction of
tourist hotels (mostly in joint ventures with foreign capital) that even before
the pandemic were filled to well below their capacity, while agriculture is
starved of government investments. This unilateral choice of priorities by the
one-party state is an example of what results from profoundly undemocratic
practices. This is not a “flaw” of the Cuban
system any more than the relentless pursuit of profit is a “flaw” of American capitalism. Both bureaucracy and
the absence of democracy in Cuba and the relentless pursuit of profit in the
United States are not defects of but constitutive elements of
both systems.
Similarly, oil has become increasingly scarce as Venezuelan oil shipments in
exchange for Cuban medical services have declined. There is no doubt that
Trump’s strengthening of the criminal blockade, which went beyond merely
reversing Obama’s liberalization during his second period in the White House,
has also gravely hurt the island, among other reasons because it has made it
more difficult for the Cuban government to use banks abroad, whether American
or not, to finance its operations. This is because the U.S. government will
punish enterprises who do business with Cuba by blocking them from doing
business with the United States. Until the events of July 11,the
Biden administration had left almost all of Trump’s sanctions untouched. Since
then, it has promised to allow for larger remittances and to provide staff for
the American consulate in Havana.
While the criminal blockade has been very real and seriously damaging, it
has been relatively less important in creating economic havoc than what lies at
the very heart of the Cuban economic system: the bureaucratic, inefficient and
irrational control and management of the economy by the Cuban government. It is
the Cuban government and its “left” allies in
the Global North, not the Cuban people, who continue, as they have for decades,
to blame only the blockade.
At the same time, the working class in the urban and rural areas have
neither economic incentives nor political incentives in the form of democratic
control of their workplaces and society to invest themselves in their work,
thus reducing the quantity and quality of production.
Health Situation in Cuba
After the Covid-19 pandemic broke out in the
early spring of 2020, Cuba did relatively well
during the first year of the pandemic in comparison with other countries in the
region. But in the last few months the situation in Cuba, for what are still
unclear reasons except for the entry of the Delta variant in the island, made
a sharp turn for the worse, and in doing so seriously aggravated the
economic and political problems of the country. Thus, as Jessica Domínguez
Delgado noted in the Cuban blog El Toque (July 13),
until April 12, a little more than a year
after the beginning of the pandemic, 467 persons had
died among the 87,385
cases that had been diagnosticated as having Covid-19.
But only three months later, on July 12, the number
of the deceased had reached 1,579
with 224, 914 diagnosed
cases (2.5 times as many
as in the much longer previous period).
The province of Matanzas and its capital city of the same name located 100 kilometers east of Havana became the epicenter of
the pandemic’s sudden expansion in Cuba. According to the provincial governor,
Matanzas province was 3,000
beds short of the number of patients that needed them. On July 6, a personal friend who lives in the city of
Matanzas wrote to me about the dire health situation in the city with
a lack of doctors, tests, and oxygen in the midst of collapsing hospitals.
My friend wrote that the national government had shown itself incapable of
controlling the situation until that very day when it finally formulated
a plan of action for the city. The government did finally take
a number of measures including sending a substantial number of additional
medical personnel, although it is too early to tell at the time of this writing
with what results.
Cuban scientists and research institutions deserve a lot of credit for
the development of several anti-Covid vaccines. However, the government was
responsible for the excessive and unnecessary delay in immunizing people on the
island, made worse by its decision to neither procure donations of vaccines
from abroad nor join the 190-nation strong COVAX
(Covid-19 Vaccines Global Access) sponsored by
several international organizations including the World Health Organization
(WHO), an organization with which the Cuban government has good relations.
Currently only 16% of the population has been fully
vaccinated and 30% has received at least one dose of
the vaccine.
The medical crisis in the province and capital city of Matanzas fits into
a more general pattern of medical scarcity and abandonment as the Cuban
government has accelerated its export of medical personnel abroad to strengthen
what has been for some time its number one export. This is why the valuable
family doctor program introduced in the 1980s has
seriously deteriorated. While the Cuban government uses a sliding scale
(including some pro bono work) in what it charges its foreign government
clients, Cuban doctors get an average of 10 – 25% of what the foreign clients pay the Cuban government.
Needless to add, Cuban medical personnel cannot organize independent unions to
bargain with the government about the terms of their employment. Nevertheless,
going abroad is a desired assignment for most Cuban doctors because they
earn a significant amount of hard currency and can purchase foreign goods.
However, if they fail to return to Cuba after their assignments are over, they
are administratively (i.e., not judicially) punished with a forced exile
of 8 years duration.
The Political Context
Earlier this year, the leadership old guard, who fought the Batista regime
and are in their late eighties and early nineties, retired from their
government positions to give way to the new leadership of Miguel Díaz-Canel
(born in 1960) as president and Manuel Marrero Cruz
(born in 1963) as prime minister. This new
leadership is continuing Raúl Castro’s policy of economic and social
liberalization without democratization. For example, in 2013
the government liberalized the regulations that controlled the movement of
people to make it easier for most Cubans to travel abroad. However, at the same
time, the government made it virtually impossible for many dissidents to leave
the country, by for example delaying their departure so they could not make it
on time to conferences held abroad, and by creating a list of some 200 “regulados” (people
subject to regulatory rules) that are not allowed to leave the country at all.
It is important to point out that as in the case of other measures adopted by
the Cuban government mentioned earlier, these actions continue the policies of
Fidel and Raúl Castro, in which political and administrative decisions are made
outside of the regime’s own judicial system. The same applies to the hundreds
of relatively brief detentions that the government of Raúl Castro carried out
every year, especially to try to impede public demonstrations not controlled by
the government (a police method that only works for previously planned
political protests, unlike the ones that took place on July 11).
The One-Party State
The one-party state continues to function as under Fidel and Raúl Castro’s
rule. In reality, however, the Cuban Communist Party (PCC, its Spanish acronym)
is not really a party — that would imply the existence of other parties.
Neither is the PCC primarily an electoral party although it does firmly control
from the top the periodic so-called elections that always result in the
unanimous approval of the political course followed by the authorities.
Sometimes people disillusioned with the existing corrupt parties in Latin
America and even in the United States itself, react with indifference if not
approval to the Cuban one-party state because they perceive elections as
reinforcing corrupt systems. Thus such people think that is better to have one
honest political party that works than a corrupt multi-party system that
doesn’t work. The problem with this type of thinking is that one-party
bureaucratic systems do not work well at all, except perhaps to thoroughly
repress any opposition. Moreover, corruption sooner or later works its way into
the single party system as history has repeatedly shown. In the case of Cuba,
Fidel Castro himself warned in a famous speech on November 17, 2005, that the revolution
was in greater danger to perish because of endemic corruption than because of
the actions of counterrevolutionaries.
The organizational monopoly of the PCC — explicitly sanctioned by the Cuban
constitution — affects far more than elections. It extends its power in
a highly authoritarian manner to control Cuban society through the
so-called mass organizations that function as transmission belts for the
decisions taken by the PCC’s Political Bureau. For example, the CTC, the
official trade union, is the transmission belt that allows the Cuban state to
maintain its monopoly of the organization of Cuban workers. Beyond enforcing
the prohibition of strikes, the CTC is not an organization for the defense of
working class interests as determined by the workers themselves. Rather, it was
established to advance what the ruling PCC leadership determines are the
workers’ best interests.
The same control mechanisms apply to other “mass
organizations” such as the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC) and to other
institutions such as editorial houses, universities and the rest of the educational
system. The mass media (radio, television and newspapers) continue to be under
the control of the government, guided in their coverage by the “orientations” of the Ideological Department of the
Central Committee of the PCC. There are however, two important exceptions to
the state’s control of media organs: one, is the internal publications of the
Catholic Church. Nevertheless, the Cuban Catholic hierarchy is extremely
cautious, and the circulation of its publications is in any case limited to its
parishes and other Catholic institutions. A far more important exception
is the Internet, which the government has yet been unable to place under its
absolute control and remains as the principal vehicle for critical and
dissident voices. It was precisely this less than full control of the Internet
that made the nationwide politically explosive outbreaks of July 11 possible.
Where is Cuba Going?
Without the benefit of Fidel Castro’s presence and the degree of legitimacy
retained by the historic leadership, Díaz-Canel and the other new government
leaders were politically hit hard by the events of July 11,
even though they received the shameful support of most of the broad
international Left. The fact that people no longer seem to be afraid may be the
single largest threat for the government emerging from the events on July 11. In spite of that blow, the new leadership is on course
to continue Raúl Castro’s orientation to develop a Cuban version of the
Sino-Vietnamese model, which combine a high degree of political
authoritarianism with concessions to private and especially
foreign capital.
At the same time, the Cuban government leaders will continue to follow
inconsistent and even contradictory economic reform policies for fear of losing
control to Cuban private capital. The government recently authorized
the creation of private PYMES (small and medium private enterprises), but it
would not be at all surprising if many of the newly created PYMES end up in the
hands of important state functionaries turned private capitalists. There is an
important government stratum composed of business managers and technicians with
ample experience in such sectors as tourism, particularly in the military. The
most important among them is the 61-year-old Gen.
Alberto Rodríguez López-Calleja, a former son-in-law of Raúl Castro, who
is the director of GAESA, the huge military business conglomerate, which
includes Gaviota, the principal tourist enterprise in the island. It is
significant that he recently became a member of the Political Bureau of
the PCC.
Perhaps this younger generation of business military and civilian
bureaucrats may try to overcome the rentier mentality that 30 years
of ample Soviet assistance created among the Cuban leadership as witnessed the
failure to modernize and diversify the sugar industry (as Brazil did) during
those relatively prosperous years that ended in 1990. To
be sure, the U.S. economic blockade contributed to the rentier mentality by
encouraging a day-to-day economic survival attitude rather than of
increasing the productivity of the Cuban economy to allow for a more
prosperous future.
Finally, what about the United States? Biden is unlikely to do much in his
first term to change the United States’ imperialist policies towards Cuba that
were significantly aggravated by Trump. Whether a possible second
Democratic administration in Washington beginning in 2025
will do anything different remains an open question.
There is, however, a paradox underlying the U.S. government’s Cuba
policy. While U.S. policy is not at present primarily driven by ruling class
interests but, rather, by electoral considerations, particularly in the highly
contested state of Florida, it is not for that reason necessarily less harsh
or, what is more alarming, less durable. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, probably
the most politically active business institution in the United States has
advocated the resumption of normal business relations with Cuba for many years.
Thomas J. Donohue, its long-time director who retired earlier this year,
visited Cuba in numerous occasions and met with government leaders there. Big
agribusiness concerns are also interested in doing business with Cuba as are
agricultural and other business interests in the South, Southwest and Mountain
States represented by both Republican and Democratic politicians. However, it
is doubtful that they are inclined to expend a lot of political capital in
achieving that goal.
This places a heavy extra burden on the U.S. Left to overcome the
deadlock, which clearly favors the indefinite continuation of the blockade,
through a new type of campaign that both zeroes in on the grave aggression
and injustice committed against the Cuban people without at the same time
becoming apologists for the political leadership of the Cuban state.
Be that as it may, people on the Left in the United States have two key
tasks. First, they should firmly oppose the criminal economic blockade of Cuba.
Second, they should support the democratic rights of the Cuban people rather
than an ossified police state, in the same way that they have supported the
struggle for human rights, democracy, and radical social and economic change in
Colombia and Chile in Latin America as well as Myanmar and Hong Kong
in Asia.
*Arturo López-Levy es doctor en estudios internacionales por la Universidad de Denver, y master en relaciones internacionales y economía por las universidades de Columbia (NYC) y Carleton (Ottawa). Se especializa en Cuba, Latinoamérica y política estadounidense.
Para explicar las protestas en Cuba del domingo 11 de julio empecemos por lo que es conocido: la economía y la pandemia. Los manifestantes cubanos no son distintos de los de otros países latinoamericanos. Están asustado y hambrientos por la subida de los precios y carencias de alimentos. Están ansiosos y angustiados por la incertidumbre sobre cuándo terminará la pandemia. Lo sorprendente es que no se haya roto el cántaro después de tantos meses llevándolo a la fuente.
Las raíces
La isla
ya venía renqueando por décadas con una crisis estructural del modelo
estatista, remendado de vez en vez con algunas aperturas al mercado que en
ausencia de una transición integral a una economía mixta orientada al mercado
solo producían reanimaciones parciales. Esos cambios segmentados creaban
islotes de mercado que demandaban más reformas que el gobierno cubano trataba
con la lentitud del que tiene todo el tiempo del mundo. La reunificación
monetaria y cambiaria, proclamada como necesaria desde finales de los años
noventa, no ocurrió hasta 2020, en el peor momento, en medio de la pandemia.
Por otra
parte, la pandemia no solo ha sembrado muertes, y destrucción económica, sino
también el miedo y la incertidumbre en una población desesperada que no ve
cuando la angustia de vivir en el límite termina. A pesar del conocimiento
sobre su deterioro, la población cubana actuó confiada en la capacidad de su
sistema de salud en tanto este contuvo el avance del virus y avanzaba en la
experimentación para vacunas propias. El hechizo, sin embargo, se deshizo
cuando en el último mes se dispararon los casos.
A pesar
de un sistema de salud de cobertura universal y su relativo desempeño positivo,
información a la población y liderazgo apegado a criterios científicos, la
pandemia terminó por exponer con crudeza el mayor problema para el sector de
bienestar social cubano: sin una economía que lo respalde ese sistema de salud
estará siempre a merced de una crisis que agote sus recursos. Cuba es el
único país latinoamericano capaz de producir dos vacunas propias. A la vez su
campaña de vacunación ha tenido notables retrasos para implementarse por falta
de fondos para comprar sus componentes y otros elementos relacionados.
Paradójico.
Las
protestas del domingo indican un hartazgo en el que concurre mucha
insatisfacción con la arrogancia y gestión gubernamental. Pero ingenuo sería
ignorar que el contexto de las sanciones ilegales, inmorales y
contraproducentes de Washington contra Cuba han hecho el problema difícil de la
pandemia, casi intratable. El lema de “la libertad” suena muy rítmico pero
detrás de los que rompen vidrieras, vuelcan perseguidoras, y la emprenden a
pedradas contra las autoridades hay mucho del “hambre, desesperación y
desempleo” que pedía Lester D Mallory para poner a los cubanos de
rodillas.
La
pandemia y su impacto económico son los factores que determinan la coyuntura.
Son la última gota. Pero en la raíz de las causas que originan la protesta
hay factores estructurales que llenaron la copa para que se derramara. Entre esos factores, dos son
fundamentales. Primero, el desajuste de una economía de comando nunca
transformada a un nuevo paradigma de economía mixta de mercado, atrapada en un
nefasto equilibrio de reforma parcial; y segundo, un sistema de sanciones por
parte de Estados Unidos que representa un asedio de guerra económica, imposible
de limitar al concepto de un mero embargo comercial.
América Latina ante Cuba
Ninguna
región del mundo ha sido golpeada por la epidemia de covid-19 como América
Latina. Lo sucedido en Cuba tiene características propias pero ya no se trata
de la excepción que fue. En términos económicos, quitando el factor estructural
del bloqueo norteamericano por sesenta años, Cuba se parece cada vez más a
un típico país caribeño y centroamericano con una dependencia notable del
turismo y las remesas. En términos de desgaste, la protesta indica a la
élite cubana que, pasada la fase carismática de los líderes fundadores, en
especial Fidel Castro, la revolución es en lo esencial, una referencia
histórica.
El
espíritu de la revolución sigue presente en tanto el actual régimen político
atribuye su origen al triunfo de 1959, y Cuba sigue siendo objeto de una
política imperial norteamericana de cambio de régimen impuesto desde fuera.
Fuera de esos dos espacios específicos, particularmente el segundo, todo el
manto de excepcionalidad y las justificaciones para evadir los estándares
democráticos y de derechos humanos se han agotado. El gobierno de Cuba está
abocado, a riesgo incluso de provocar su colapso histórico, a emprender
reformas sistémicas de su paradigma.
Se trata
de construir un modelo de economía mixta viable en el cual se mantengan las
conquistas de bienestar social con un estado regulador, redistribuidor y empresario.
En lo político, eso implica un aterrizaje suave y escalonado en un modelo
político mas pluralista donde al menos diferentes fuerzas que rechacen la
política intervencionista estadounidense puedan dialogar y competir. Una
cosa es rechazar que Estados Unidos tenga derecho a imponer a sus cubanos
favoritos, otra es asumir ese rechazo como un respaldo a que el PCC nombre a
los suyos con el dedo.
Es desde
esa realidad, no desde simplismos unilaterales que niegan la agencia del pueblo
cubano o el fardo estructural del bloqueo norteamericano que una política
latinoamericana progresista puede y debe estructurarse. Las élites cubanas han
estado trabajando desde un tiempo atrás (el VI congreso del PCC en 2011) en un
modelo de transición más cercano a las experiencias china y vietnamita, de
economía de mercado con partido único, que a cualquier precedente occidental. Tal
paradigma en lo político rivaliza con los estándares de legitimidad política en
la región latinoamericana, donde el derecho a la libre asociación, la expresión
y la protesta pacífica van mucho más allá que una simple democracia
intrapartidaria leninista.
De igual
modo, el paradigma de democracia pluralista hace aguas cuando se pretende
defender los derechos humanos desde dobles estándares o la ingenua ignorancia
del rol de los factores internacionales y las asimetrías de poder. Discutir
sobre la democracia en Cuba sin mencionar la intromisión indebida de Estados
Unidos en maridaje con la derecha anticomunista y la violación flagrante,
sistemática y masiva de derechos humanos, que es el bloqueo, equivale a
conversar sobre Hamlet sin mencionar al príncipe de Dinamarca. En Miami,
los sectores de derecha pro-bloqueo defienden los derechos humanos martes y
jueves, mientras el resto de la semana crean un ambiente descrito por Human
Rights Watch en el informe “Dangerous Dialogue” como “desfavorable a la
libertad de expresión”. En terminos de transicion a un sistema politico
cubano mas abierto, con actores de tan malas credenciales, es imprescindible un
proceso pacifico, gradual y ordenado. Esos adjetivos son tan importantes como
el proceso mismo.
No solo
la izquierda radical, sino importantes componentes moderados de la diáspora
cubana y alternativas democráticas dentro de la intelectualidad y la sociedad
civil cubana han expresado decepción por segmentos de la comunidad de derechos
humanos, como Amnistía Internacional, por su falta de trabajo sistemático en la
denuncia del bloqueo norteamericano contra Cuba. Si un opositor de derecha,
conectado a la política imperial de cambio de régimen, es detenido en Cuba, la
directora Erika Guevara Rosas otorga un seguimiento permanente a su caso. Sus
denuncias a la política imperial de bloqueo no lo catalogan como violación
sistemática de derechos. Ocurren de vez en vez, y enfatizando que es una excusa
del gobierno cubano que debe ser eliminada. ¿Por qué no protestaba cada
vez que Trump implementó una nueva sanción que afectaba el derecho de salud, el
de educación, y otros más, incluidos los de viaje, de cubanos y
estadounidenses?
Las
protestas contra el gobierno que salió de la revolución representan
un reto para la discusión del tema Cuba en América Latina que solo podrá
madurar desde el entendimiento de su complejidad, sin simplismos ni falsas
analogías. En primer
lugar, Cuba vive un conflicto de soberanía con Estados Unidos, que marca
estructuralmente su vida política y económica. Nadie que quiera contribuir a
una solución constructiva de los temas cubanos, latinoamericana para problemas
latinoamericanos, puede ignorar ese fardo. La OEA, por ejemplo, es un escenario
minado a evitar pues ha sido un instrumento de la política de acoso y
aislamiento. Se necesita una visión del siglo XXI, desde la autonomía
latinoamericana ante los grandes poderes, incluyendo Estados Unidos, que admita
la pluralidad de modelos de estado y desarrollo, sin imponer moldes
neoliberales.
No solo la izquierda radical, sino importantes
componentes moderados de la diáspora cubana y alternativas democráticas dentro
de la intelectualidad y la sociedad civil cubana han expresado decepción por
segmentos de la comunidad de derechos humanos, como Amnistía Internacional, por
su falta de trabajo sistemático en la denuncia del bloqueo norteamericano
contra Cuba.
En lugar
de reeditar los conflictos de guerra fría, esa visión de pluralismo ideológico
pondría en el centro de la acción una perspectiva respetuosa de la soberanía
cubana, pero concebida de un modo moderno, más allá de la mera defensa de
la no intervención. Cuba vive en una región donde la protesta de todos los
estados no ha sido capaz de hacer a Estados Unidos entrar en razones sobre la
ilegalidad del asedio contra la isla. Exigir una elección pluripartidista en
Cuba ignorando las sanciones equivalentes a una guerra económica, donde se
violan consideraciones de derecho humanitario, es otorgar a la derecha
cubana una ventaja que nunca ha merecido. Como los Borbones franceses, los
que se plegaron a la invasión de Bahía de Cochinos, asesinaron a Orlando
Letelier, y han construido un enclave autoritario en las narices de la primera
enmienda de la constitución norteamericana, no olvidan ni aprenden nada.
A su vez, América Latina es una región que ha cambiado, donde traficar con excepciones al modelo de la Declaración Universal de Derechos Humanos es inaceptable. Claro que hay pluralidad de implementación y argumentos de emergencia sobre las que los estados erigen desviaciones más o menos justificadas. Pero el paradigma de un sistema unipartidista leninista que castigue la protesta pacífica por rivalizar con el supuesto rol dirigente del partido comunista es incompatible con la premisa central de que la soberanía está en el pueblo, la nación, no en partido alguno. Una cosa es argumentar que, en condiciones específicas de emergencia, decretadas acorde al modelo de la Declaración Universal, algunos derechos pueden postergarse. Otra, e inaceptable, es el pretexto de una “democracia” unipartidista que no puede ser tal sin libertad de asociación. Partido, recordemos, viene de parte.
“While the nationwide
popular protests of July 11-12 in Cuba prompted governments around the world to
take clear stands on this unprecedented event, the Trudeau government was
hesitant,” writes
Yvon Grenier. – Reuters
Yvon
Grenier is a professor, department of political science and resident fellow,
Mulroney Institute of Government, St. Francis Xavier University, Antigonish
That was
an interesting week in Canada-Cuba relations! While the nationwide popular
protests of July 11-12 in Cuba prompted governments around the world to take
clear stands on this unprecedented event, Ottawa was clumsy and hesitant.
As of
July 19, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had made two short comments, and only
when pressed by journalists to speak about Havana’s repression of those
protests.
On July
13, Trudeau gave a dry run to a neutral statement: “Canada has always stood in
friendship with the Cuban people,” and added: “We have always called for
greater freedoms and more defence of human rights in Cuba. We will continue to
be there to support Cubans in their desire for greater peace, greater stability
and greater voice in how things are going.”
Couldn’t
that comment be applied to almost any country — even democratic and stable
ones?
This
hesitancy to point the finger at the Cuban regime was not a surprise from this
prime minister. He got into trouble for his strange tribute to Fidel Castro in
2016, saying, for instance, that Castro’s “supporters and detractors
recognized his tremendous dedication and love for the Cuban people.” No, his
detractors will never recognize that.
That was
only days after a gushing speech he delivered at the University of Havana, in
which he said, astonishingly, that amicable relations with communist Cuba was
“one of the ways we reassure ourselves that we are our own country.” Canada’s
national identity must be pathetically weak indeed.
Back to
the present. On July 15, as the Cuban dictatorship’s repression could not be
denied, came Trudeau’s second statement — again prompted by a pesky journalist
(Got to love them!): “We’re deeply concerned by the violent crackdown on
protests by the Cuban regime. We condemn the arrests and repression by authorities
of peaceful demonstration.”
He added:
“We stand, as we always will, with the people of Cuba who want and deserve
democracy, freedom and respect.”
He did
not shift the blame to the U.S. embargo, as the NDP and other voices from the
left did, in chorus with countries like Iran and Russia. (The NDP statement
also mentions the party’s “support for the fundamental rights of freedom of
expression and assembly.”)
Meanwhile,
Global Affairs Canada went on automatic pilot. On July 13, according to the
CBC, a spokesperson described how they were “closely monitoring the situation
in Cuba,” and dusted off some boilerplate statements on how “all parties”
should “exercise restraint” and “engage in peaceful and inclusive
dialogue.”
Those
normally apply to violent conflicts with two or more armed groups, not to a
violent government crackdown of peaceful protests. Global Affairs reiterated
that “Canada supports the right of freedom of expression and assembly.” But
again, absurdly, it called “on all parties to uphold this fundamental
right.”
During
that week, Global Affairs made public statements on Foreign Affairs Minister
Marc Garneau’s meetings with both the U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken,
and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, both of whom
had already made clear and forceful statements on the situation in Cuba. Global
Affairs mentions discussions on many countries: Haiti, Afghanistan, Belarus,
Venezuela, Nicaragua, others. But not Cuba, even though it was most probably
discussed.
In 2016,
when a Canadian journalist asked Trudeau point-blank if the regime built by
Fidel Castro was a dictatorship, he responded (after a pregnant pause) “yes.” A
hint of reason over passion; or at least, over a very Canadian naiveté,
afforded by decades of unthinking “engagement” with a repressive regime. Recent
developments forced the Trudeau government to turn off the automatic pilot and
really think about how Cubans are ruled.
In all likelihood, Canada will “continue to be there to support Cubans” if and when they undertake a transition to democracy. There might be some muddling through getting to that point, but the arc of Trudeau’s aggiornamento on Cuba now seems to point in the direction of reason governing a more mature policy toward this beautiful country moving forward. It just took a crisis to get out of the comfort zone.
Thousands of
protesters thronged the streets on July 11th. Some stoned the police and
looted posh shops. Such outbursts are unprecedented in Cuba since the
communists secured their hold on power in the 1960s. “Freedom!” and “Down with
the dictatorship!” they chanted, and “Patria y Vida!” (Fatherland and Life),
quoting an underground reggaeton song that mocks Fidel Castro’s tired slogan of
“Fatherland or Death”.
All this poses an extraordinary
challenge to the dull bureaucrats who rule Cuba, after the death of Fidel and
the retirement of his younger brother, Raúl, earlier this year. The regime has
responded with repression. “Revolutionaries, to the streets,” urged
Miguel Díaz-Canel, the president who this year took the helm of the Communist
Party, unleashing troops, police and loyalist mobs wielding baseball bats. At
least one person was killed. Scores have been detained and the government has
sporadically cut access to the internet.
Repression may work in Cuba, as it
has elsewhere. But something there has snapped. The tacit contract that kept
social peace for six decades is broken. Many Cubans used to put up with a police
state because it guaranteed their basic needs, and those with initiative found
a way to leave. Now Cubans are fed up. When Mr Díaz-Canel blames the protests
on “American imperialism”, all he shows is how out of touch he is. The
protesters are young, mainly black and dismiss the Castros’ revolution of 1959
against an American-backed tyrant as ancient history.
They have plenty to complain about.
The pandemic has shut off foreign tourism, aggravating the economy’s lack of
hard currency. Raúl Castro launched economic reforms, but they were timid and
slow, permitting only minuscule private businesses. It was left to Mr
Díaz-Canel to take the most momentous step, by ordering a big devaluation in
January. Without measures to allow more private investment and growth, that has
merely triggered inflation. As its sanctions-hit oil industry collapses,
Venezuela, Cuba’s chief foreign patron over the past 15 years, has curbed its
cut-price oil shipments, prompting power cuts during the heat of summer.
Chronic shortages of food and medicine have become acute. Despite Cuba’s
prowess at public health and its development of its own vaccine, the government
has failed to contain the pandemic. The sick are dying, abandoned at home or on
hospital floors.
Two other factors explain the
outburst. One is the change of leadership. The Castros commanded respect even
among the many Cubans who abhorred them. Mr Díaz-Canel, without a shred of
charisma, does not. And the internet and social media, allowed only in the past
few years, have broken the regime’s monopoly of information, connecting younger
Cubans to each other and the world. They have empowered a cultural protest
movement of artists and musicians. Its message, in the unanswerable lyrics of
“Patria y Vida”, is “Your time’s up, the silence is broken…we’re not scared,
the deception is over.”
Mr Díaz-Canel faces a choice: to turn
Cuba into Belarus with sunshine, or to assuage discontent by allowing more
private enterprise and greater cultural freedom. That could weaken the army and
the Communist Party, but it would eventually salvage some of the revolution’s
original social gains.
Curiously, many Republicans in the
United States echo Mr Díaz-Canel’s description of America’s role in the
protests. President Donald Trump tightened the economic embargo against Cuba,
barring American tourists, curbing remittances and slapping sanctions on state
firms, largely reversing Barack Obama’s opening to the island. Like Cuba’s
president, Republicans argue that the unrest proves the embargo is working at
last.
Not so. True, the embargo has made
life harder for the Cuban government. But its restrictions mainly hurt
Americans. The regime can still buy American food and medicine and trade with
the world. The causes of Cuba’s social explosion lie at home.
Open the windows
Joe Biden should draw the obvious conclusion. So far he has left Mr Trump’s Cuba policy intact, so as not to annoy hawkish Cuban-Americans. Instead he should return to Mr Obama’s approach. The big threat to a closed regime is engagement with the world, especially the United States. Mr Biden should lift the embargo and deprive the regime of an excuse for its own failures.
En días pasados estallaron protestas sociales en diversas localidades de Cuba. Para los dirigentes cubanos y los medios oficiales de prensa que responden al gobierno cubano, se trata de “disturbios, desorden, causados por una operación comunicacional que se prepara desde hace tiempo”, propiciados por “mercenarios al servicio del imperialismo”. Sin embargo, más allá de una retórica que se basa en el no reconocimiento de la realidad política, económica y social que vive el país y en achacar la responsabilidad de las protestas, denominadas desórdenes -aunque los hubo como en todas las protestas-, a agentes al servicio de intereses extranjeros, Cuba enfrenta desde hace muchos años una crisis económica y social de graves proporciones que se ha transformado en una crisis política. Es imprescindible debatir acerca de las causas pero también abrir un debate sobre las alternativas y posibles soluciones, con el objeto de evitar que el país llegue a un callejón sin salida.
Las
razones económicas.
La
situación económica actual de Cuba es la más terrible desde el llamado Período
Especial de los años noventa del pasado siglo. En 2020, el Producto Interior
Bruto (PIB) cayó un 11,3% pero ya en 2019 se había producido una caída del 0,2%
y el crecimiento promedio anual entre 2015 y 2019 fue de solo 1,7%, lo cual es
insuficiente para asegurar una senda de desarrollo económico. El gobierno
cubano ha insistido en responsabilizar al bloqueo estadounidense y a los
efectos de la pandemia con la situación económica del país. El recrudecimiento
de las sanciones económicas durante la administración de Trump y la aparición y
ahora el empeoramiento de la pandemia han tenido efectos nocivos indudables en
la economía cubana, sin embargo, no son los responsables de los graves
problemas estructurales que ésta padece.
A lo
largo de más de seis décadas se han ido acumulando serios problemas que
dependen, principalmente, de los sucesivos errores de política económica
cometidos por la dirección del país, que han conducido a un incremento de la
vulnerabilidad externa de la economía cubana y han dificultado el desarrollo de
la producción nacional, debido a la excesiva centralización de las decisiones
económicas, a la incapacidad para generar suficientes estímulos al desarrollo
productivo y a los frenos que se han impuesto al emprendimiento.
Las
reformas económicas que se han realizado desde los años noventa han sido
parciales e insuficientes, no han abordado los cambios estructurales de forma
sistémica y no han apuntado a la promoción del emprendimiento empresarial. La
mayor parte de las ramas de la industria nacional y varias de las más
importantes producciones agropecuarias en 2019 tenían niveles inferiores a los
de 1989. A partir de la crisis de los noventa el gobierno optó por el
desarrollo del turismo. Fue una decisión parcialmente correcta pero lo que no
debió ocurrir es que ese desarrollo obviara las necesidades del desarrollo
industrial y agrícola del país.
La
excesiva dependencia respecto al turismo es una causa estructural fundamental
en la debacle actual de una economía que prácticamente carece de reservas y de
alternativas productivas, con una industria azucarera que está produciendo a
niveles de principios del siglo XX, con el resto de la industria prácticamente
colapsada y con una agricultura afectada por una estructura de precios y
excesivos controles que desestimulan el desarrollo de la producción de
alimentos y de materias primas.
Con
campañas políticas no se resuelven los problemas de la producción. El país está
importando gran parte de los alimentos que podría producir y carece de las
divisas necesarias para importarlos. Para colmo, se insiste en el control
monopólico estatal del comercio exterior. Sigue sin dar los pasos necesarios
para promover la legalización de pequeñas y medianas empresas privadas que
promuevan el emprendimiento y canalicen el empleo superfluo que es una excesiva
carga al presupuesto del Estado. Persisten en la planificación centralizada en
condiciones de una inmensa escasez y no generan otras alternativas. En los años
noventa el turismo fue una alternativa y a comienzos del siglo XXI, la
exportación de servicios profesionales, principalmente a Venezuela, se
convirtió en otra opción muy importante de ingresos en divisas. Estos junto a
las remesas, aseguraron la subsistencia económica del país.
En la
actualidad, el turismo está en niveles mínimos, las remesas afectadas por las
limitaciones de sus fuentes debido a problemas económicos de los remitentes y
al endurecimiento de las sanciones durante la era de Trump, mientras que los
ingresos por exportaciones de servicios están afectados por su cierre en
ciertos países pero sobre todo por la terrible crisis económica venezolana.
Entonces, el gobierno no ha querido salirse del guión que ha determinado la
política económica, ha actuado con muchísima lentitud y ha adoptado medidas
económicas equivocadas.
Los
errores más recientes de política económica.
A lo
largo de estas décadas se han acumulado una serie de errores de política
económica, pero en las condiciones actuales quisiera concentrarme en dos: 1) la
llamada Tarea Ordenamiento y 2) la apertura de tiendas en monedas libremente
convertibles (MLC) para la venta de productos que originalmente se describían
como “suntuarios” pero que en realidad resultaron de primera necesidad, no solo
para las condiciones de la vida moderna sino incluso para la subsistencia.
El
llamado Ordenamiento monetario no fue tal. Desde hace tiempo muchos economistas
hemos destacado la necesidad de abolir la dualidad monetaria por el desorden en
los sistemas de costos, en el funcionamiento de las empresas y en el
establecimiento de precios relativos respecto a la economía internacional.
Adoptaron la unificación monetaria y cambiaria como un lineamiento del 6º
Congreso del PCC en 2011 y finalmente en 2021 decidieron unificar los tipos de
cambio a una tasa sobrevaluada, a la cual el Banco Central no puede asegurar la
venta de la divisa extranjera, con lo que, inmediatamente, se desarrolló el
mercado negro de divisas en el que el dólar se cotiza a varias veces por encima
del valor oficial.
En lugar
de establecer la soberanía del peso cubano como moneda nacional, crearon
tiendas en MLC, re-dolarizando parcialmente la economía y vendiendo en ese
mercado bienes a los cuales no tiene acceso la población que carece de remesas
o de opciones de ingresos en divisas, generando un grave problema social debido
a la marginación de un sector considerable de la población en la capacidad de
adquirir dichos bienes.
La
unificación cambiaria llegó acompañada de un incremento de salarios en el
sector estatal y de pensiones en niveles claramente inferiores a los
incrementos reales en los precios, producidos por una estampida inflacionaria,
lo cual ha causado gran insatisfacción en una parte considerable de la
ciudadanía que continúa sin asegurar sus necesidades básicas a partir de sus
ingresos debidos al trabajo.
Los
problemas sociales.
La
insatisfacción creada por los errores de política económica y la persistencia
de los mismos a veces ha podido canalizarse por los mecanismos controlados por
el poder pero ni esas ni aquellas que ni siquiera han podido ser planteadas
oficialmente sino que se expresan en redes sociales, han tenido una respuesta
creíble más allá de achacar al bloqueo de todo cuanto no funciona. No se trata
de anexionistas, ni de delincuentes, ni de agentes de alguna potencia
extranjera. Se trata simplemente de ciudadanos cubanos que necesitan satisfacer
aspiraciones en la única vida probada que tienen y que sienten que el gobierno
del país no está siendo capaz de ofrecer las alternativas de solución
necesarias.
La
sociedad cubana de hoy es claramente diferente a la que decidió permanecer en
el país tras el triunfo revolucionario. Existe un porcentaje creciente de
jóvenes, que están a dos o tres generaciones de la que hizo la Revolución y que
tiene esperanzas de vida, intereses, aspiraciones y proyecciones políticas y
sociales propias y muy probablemente diferentes y a las que incluso la
Constitución actual les priva del derecho a definir el tipo de Estado y de
sociedad que prefiere. Y dentro de este grupo, existe una parte considerable de
personas que viven en condiciones de subsistencia y no ve opciones de
mejoramiento de las mismas.
En otras
oportunidades, la emigración, incluso con cierto nivel de masividad, como
ocurrió en los primeros años sesenta, en 1980 y en 1994, ha actuado como
válvula de escape para solucionar las insatisfacciones individuales, pero
también para reducir el factor de oposición social interna. En esta ocasión
esta posibilidad está claramente muy limitada.
La
emigración carece de derechos políticos, pero a ella se ha apelado, una y otra
vez, para que haga valer sus derechos al envío de remesas familiares pero sin
reconocerla socialmente como un factor importante para la solución de los
problemas económicos del país y sin integrarla políticamente en un sistema
democrático. La emigración es un factor decisivo en la solución de muchos de
los problemas económicos del país y también debería ser un importante actor
político a partir de su experiencia en otras realidades.
En la
sociedad cubana existe una parte considerable que carece de opciones y de
perspectivas, que vive en una situación de pobreza que no es reconocida
públicamente por las autoridades cubanas. En consecuencia, gran parte de esa
población salió a las calles como explosión de una situación de hastío. Sin
embargo, hay que tener en cuenta que antes de eso ya se habían producido una
serie de indicios de protesta pacífica en diversos sectores sociales, incluidos
los artistas, reclamando espacios de diálogo que solo han encontrado la
intolerancia y el rechazo como respuesta.
Los
problemas políticos.
Todo este
conjunto de cuestiones ha llevado a una crisis política de la cual estas
protestas públicas han sido solo un primer momento, si consideramos su
capacidad de difusión y su masividad. Sin embargo, existe una parte de la
sociedad cubana inconforme con la situación del país que no se expresa por
miedo a las consecuencias negativas que pueden sufrir debido a una cultura
arraigada de exclusión de las opciones políticas diferentes a las defendidas
desde las estructuras de poder. El gobierno cubano debería considerar esta
realidad política y actuar en consecuencia si realmente quiere evitar que la
fractura social y política en la sociedad cubana se profundice y supere el nivel
de polarización que ya es gravísimo.
En 2019
se adoptó una nueva Constitución que establece en su artículo 1 que “Cuba es un
Estado socialista de derecho y justicia social, democrático, independiente y
soberano, organizado con todos y para el bien de todos como república unitaria
e indivisible, fundada en el trabajo, la dignidad, el humanismo y la ética de
sus ciudadanos para el disfrute de la libertad, la equidad, la igualdad, la
solidaridad, el bienestar y la prosperidad individual y colectiva”. Sin
embargo, existen ejemplos que demuestran que muchos de esos preceptos no
reflejan la realidad política del país.
El
artículo 5 de la carta magna le otorga al Partido Comunista de Cuba, la
condición de “fuerza política superior de la sociedad y del Estado”, lo cual,
en la práctica, coloca al Partido por encima de la sociedad. Esta realidad no
tiene nada de democrática, toda vez que tampoco el Partido Comunista es una
organización democrática en su vida interna.
En esa
misma Constitución se garantizan el derecho a la vida, la integridad física y
moral, la libertad, la justicia y la seguridad …. (artículo 46); el derecho a
que se respete su intimidad personal y familiar … (artículo 48); a la
inviolabilidad de su domicilio (artículo 49); a la inviolabilidad de la correspondencia
y demás formas de comunicación (artículo 50); las personas no puede ser
sometidas a desaparición forzada, torturas ni tratos o penas crueles inhumanas
o degradantes (artículo 51); el Estado reconoce, respeta y garantiza a las
personas la libertad de pensamiento, conciencia y expresión (artículo 54); se
reconoce la libertad de prensa (artículo 55); los derechos de reunión,
manifestación y asociación, con fines lícitos y pacíficos, se reconocen por el
Estado siempre que se ejerzan con respeto al orden público y el acatamiento a
las preceptivas establecidas en la ley (artículo 56); se reconocen a las
personas los derechos derivados de la creación intelectual (artículo 62); los
ciudadanos cubanos tienen derecho a participar en la conformación, ejercicio y
control del poder del Estado, lo cual implica: estar inscriptos en el registro
electoral, proponer y nominar candidatos, elegir y ser elegidos, participar en
las elecciones, plebiscitos, referendos, consultas populares y otras formas de
participación democrática, pronunciarse sobre la rendición de cuenta que le
presentan los elegidos, ejercer la iniciativa legislativa y de reforma de la
Constitución, desempeñar cargos públicos y estar informados de la gestión de
los órganos y autoridades del Estado (artículo 80).
La mayor
parte de estos artículos, relacionados con derechos humanos y políticos está
sin reglamentar, pero al margen de esto, la propia Constitución contradice
algunos de esos derechos. Por ejemplo, la libertad de elegir y ser elegidos,
mediante el voto de los ciudadanos es restringida por el inciso “c” del
artículo 205 que establece como excepción a “los que no cumplan el requisito de
residencia en el país previstos en la ley”. Es decir, a los cubanos residentes
en el exterior, que constituyen más de un 20% de la población actual del país y
cuyas remesas han contribuido a la subsistencia del país, se les niega ese
derecho elemental que está consagrado en la mayor parte de las constituciones
de las repúblicas latinoamericanas. De igual forma, la iniciativa legislativa y
la reforma de la Constitución, contenidas también en el artículo 80 son
restringidas por el artículo 227 que trata sobre la iniciativa para promover
reformas a la Constitución, porque la iniciativa de los ciudadanos debe ser “mediante
petición dirigida a la Asamblea Nacional, firmada por un mínimo de 50.000
electores”, además de que la Constitución solo puede ser reformada por la
Asamblea Nacional en una “votación nominal no menor a dos terceras partes del
número total de sus integrantes”, es decir, que no permite que la Constitución
sea reformada o elaborada por una Asamblea Constituyente, elegida libremente
por la ciudadanía, tal y como ocurrió en 1940. Si la Asamblea Nacional es
elegida con base a una lista única que responde a las orientaciones del Partido
Comunista, es fácil intuir que sería imposible contar con ella para reformar
una constitución hecha a la medida de los intereses de la dirigencia de dicho
partido, que no necesariamente se corresponde con los intereses reales de parte
de su membresía.
A
diferencia de la mayor parte de los países latinoamericanos, los ciudadanos
cubanos carecen del derecho a elegir, mediante sufragio universal y directo,
entre varias alternativas, al Presidente y Vicepresidente de la República, a
los diputados a la Asamblea Nacional, y a las autoridades de gobierno
provinciales y municipales.
Las leyes
cubanas posteriores a 1959 no han permitido el derecho a la huelga, ni a la
formación de asociaciones sociales, profesionales o políticas que estén por
fuera del control del poder político, con lo cual se conculcan los derechos
proclamados en los artículos 54 y 56 de la Constitución.
Así, en
las cuestiones relativas a los derechos políticos, la Constitución de 2019, al igual
que la de 1976, retroceden respecto a la de 1940 que, dicho sea de paso, fue el
resultado de una Asamblea Constituyente, elegida democráticamente, en la que
también participaron delegados comunistas junto a otros del amplio espectro de
fuerzas políticas que caracterizaba a la sociedad cubana de entonces.
La
Constitución de 2019 fue aprobada en referendo nacional por una mayoría
significativa de la población, pero en su proceso de discusión y debate, solo
tuvo cabida la pedagogía del SI y en dicho referendo no se permitió votar a la
población cubana residente en el exterior que aun ostenta un pasaporte cubano.
Hasta en el régimen pinochetista en Chile se permitió la pedagogía del NO.
En los
tiempos recientes han ocurrido varios episodios en los que autoridades cubanas
han violado la Constitución aprobada por esa inmensa mayoría alcanzada entre
aquellos que tuvieron la oportunidad de ejercer su derecho al voto. Se han
producido detenciones de ciudadanos por el simple hecho de caminar por una
calle portando un cartel que exige la libertad para alguna persona detenida;
han sido detenidas personas por expresar su inconformidad y rechazo al sistema
político; fuerzas de la policía han obligado, de forma ilegal, a ciudadanos que
no están condenados judicialmente, a permanecer en sus casas en contra de su
voluntad y cuando éstos se han negado alegando su derecho a la libre movilidad,
han sido detenidos; no se han atendido solicitudes de hábeas corpus, a pesar de
que esta figura jurídica está presente en la nueva Constitución y es un derecho
universalmente reconocido en las sociedades civilizadas; se mantiene la
práctica de expulsar de ciertos centros de trabajo a personas que expresan
opiniones contrarias a las que se sostienen desde el poder político, incluso cuando
en algunos casos esas opiniones ni siquiera han cuestionado la esencia del
sistema político y social; se ha promovido y en otros casos, permitido
situaciones de hostigamiento a personas identificadas como desafectas al
gobierno del país; para solo mencionar algunos ejemplos de violaciones de la
ley suprema de la República, generadas desde las estructuras de poder, que
deberían ser sus garantes ante la sociedad.
Desde las
estructuras de poder se ha dicho que las manifestaciones del 11-J han sido
orquestadas desde el exterior. Es cierto y además público que algunos llamados
“influencer” de ciertas redes sociales ha realizado llamados a la desobediencia
civil y a la insurrección. Sin embargo, si fuera cierto que estas protestas
fueron el resultado de estos llamados y de la labor de zapa del gobierno de los
Estados Unidos, esto podría significar que el Partido Comunista carece del
liderazgo y la influencia que en Cuba que se establece como precepto
constitucional. Argumentar que las protestas fueron orquestadas desde el
exterior es un insulto a la ciudadanía y a su derecho a expresar un descontento
que antes no ha encontrado otras vías de canalización, debido a la soberbia, al
autismo y al escaso espíritu autocrítico de muchos de los que ejercen
responsabilidades de dirección en el país y que mantienen un discurso alejado
de la realidad del país.
Las
protestas sociales, a diferencia de lo que se sostiene desde el discurso
oficial, fueron el resultado de la combinación de todos esos factores a los que
se suma el hastío de muchos ciudadanos que no encuentran una salida
esperanzadora a una situación de crisis que persiste en la sociedad cubana
desde hace varias décadas pero que en las circunstancias actuales ha cobrado
una gravedad extraordinaria.
En las protestas hubo saqueos y destrucción de propiedad pública y privada, que no fueron masivos. ¿En cuáles protestas no ocurren? Es lamentable y condenable. Sin embargo, vale la pena llamar la atención sobre cuales han sido los objetos de estos actos deplorables. En unos casos, fueron algunas tiendas en MLC, que son un símbolo evidente de la diferenciación social establecida en Cuba entre los que tienen acceso a ellas y los que no, por el solo hecho de no disponer de cuentas en una moneda que no se obtiene como resultado del trabajo sino que proviene de remesas desde el exterior. Se produjo el volcamiento y destrucción de algunos automóviles de la policía y de instituciones oficiales. También se produjeron enfrentamientos entre fuerzas antimotines y de policía, tanto uniformados como vestidos de civil y los ciudadanos que protestaban. Las imágenes de supuestos civiles, perfectamente organizados, transportados en vehículos públicos y armados de palos y bates de béisbol para golpear a quienes protestaban son una muestra del insulto que ese día se profirió contra el ideario de la Revolución Cubana. Y la orden fue proferida desde el más alto nivel de dirección del país. No es la primera vez que esto ocurre, sin embargo, si es la ocasión en la que alcanzó las mayores proporciones.
Las
opciones.
A pesar
de la profundidad de la fractura social y política del 11-J y del nivel de
polarización que ha alcanzado la sociedad cubana, para bien del país, la
política debería imponerse a la golpiza.
Me opongo
a los llamados a una intervención militar extranjera que solo causaría sangre y
dolor a las familias cubanas y también en las de quienes, eventualmente,
pudieran intervenir. Y me opongo a la represión militar, policial y paramilitar
ejercida por quienes tienen el deber de proteger la seguridad del pueblo y no
mancillarlo. La vida y la dignidad deben ser preservadas.
Siento un
profundo compromiso con la idea original que inspiró la Revolución Cubana, es
decir, la democracia y la justicia social. La democracia nos ha sido confiscada
y la justicia social se despedaza en cada medida que crea excluidos en nuestra
Nación.
Una
opción que parece imponerse en el discurso oficial es la de reprimir a quienes
han sido identificados como participantes de las protestas y hacer caer sobre
ellos el peso de cuestionables figuras jurídicas, y de paso, amedrentar a
quienes pudieran protagonizar eventos similares en el futuro con medidas
ejemplarizantes. Esta opción solo profundizará la fractura de la sociedad y
solo postergaría una futura crisis política y social que podría tener
gravísimas consecuencias.
Otra
opción, que considero necesaria, sería liberar a todas las personas que han
sido detenidas por las protestas y antes de las mismas, por expresar su
desacuerdo con el gobierno o con el sistema político actualmente vigente. A fin
de cuentas, ellos no realizaron un asalto armado a un cuartel del ejército. No
hay que reprimir al descontento sino crear las condiciones para que el
descontento pueda ser convertido en satisfacción y esperanza o que al menos ese
descontento tenga vías legítimas de expresión, y ello pasa necesariamente por
una reconfiguración pacífica de nuestro sistema político.
La
Constitución actual no satisface las aspiraciones democráticas de todo el
pueblo, precisamente porque excluye a una parte del mismo en el derecho a
ejercer su soberanía por lo cual debe ser enmendada, aunque en mi opinión
debería ser elaborada una nueva que garantice el establecimiento de un sistema
democrático. Para esta enmienda, el elemento inicial debería ser la reforma de
los artículos 205, 226 y 227.
En el 205
debería eliminarse la excepción en el derecho al voto de los ciudadanos cubanos
residentes fuera del país. En el 226 debería permitirse que la Constitución sea
reformada por una Asamblea Constituyente, elegida libremente por la ciudadanía,
mediante sufragio universal, además de la actual facultad de la Asamblea
Nacional. En el 227 debería modificarse el inciso f que le otorga iniciativa a
la ciudadanía para la reforma constitucional solo como petición a la Asamblea
Nacional, mediante la recolección de 50.000 firmas, y permitir que estas firmas
puedan ser válidas para la convocatoria de una Asamblea Constituyente.
En tales
circunstancias y para hacer valer el carácter democrático del Estado que define
el artículo 1 de la Constitución, debería convocarse a una consulta nacional
vinculante, en la que puedan participar todos los ciudadanos cubanos sin
distinción de lugar de residencia e identificados con un pasaporte cubano
válido vigente y en la que los electores puedan escoger una de dos alternativas
que podrían ser: a) Desea Usted que la Constitución vigente se mantenga como
está y que su posible reforma posterior solo sea una facultad de la Asamblea
Nacional del Poder Popular; y b) Desea Usted que se convoque a una Asamblea
Constituyente, elegida mediante sufragio universal directo y secreto con
candidatos nominados o auto-nominados libremente, que elabore una nueva
Constitución.
Lo
verdaderamente revolucionario, lo verdaderamente progresista, no solo es la
urgente necesidad de liberar las fuerzas productivas y el emprendimiento
productivo que pueda iniciar la recuperación de la economía y encauzar el
proceso de desarrollo, sino también resulta urgente la construcción de un nuevo
consenso político, sobre la base del establecimiento de una sociedad
verdaderamente democrática en la que tengan cabida las diferencias políticas y
el imperio de la ley y de la justicia social.
mauriciodemiranda
La
Habana, 1 de abril de 1958. Doctor en Economía Internacional y Desarrollo,
Universidad Complutense de Madrid, España. Licenciado en Economía, Universidad
de La Habana, Cuba. Profesor Titular del Departamento de Economía de la
Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, Cali, Colombia. Ver
todas las entradas de mauriciodemiranda
