Updating Immigration Policy in Cuba

The mere fact of hearing it on television petrifies me, but listening to the president of my county has been illuminating, because in revolutionary Cuba there are issues so ethereal that they never find an appropriate occasion to be raised “procedurally,” taboos the single mention of which give one goosebumps, themes that cannot be approached without people looking at you, eyes wide with terror.

This is the case with the immigration policy the Cuban government has maintained over the last 50 years, one of the most traumatic and thorny issues in Cuban society. The twisted mechanisms created to impede the free flow of people, whether to travel or to emigrate, have turned what would normally be one more choice in the life of any Cuban, into a real ordeal.

During his speech delivered to the Cuban Parliament on August 1, 2011, Raul Castro announced that work was now underway “…to implement the upgrade of the current immigration policy…” While I welcome the proposal — given that Fidel Castro never announced anything like this in his entire time in government — I quickly curbed my enthusiasm when, a minute later, Raul specified that “…the flexibilization of the policy will take into account the right of the revolutionary State to defend itself from the interventionist and subversive plans of the United States government and its allies, and at the same time will include reasonable countermeasures to preserve the human capital created by the Revolution in the face of the theft of talent practiced by the powerful.”

Stated thus, is this a way of saying he’s going to put the usual patch over the tatters? Suddenly I sensed he was talking about me because, being a doctor, I am subject to the super-punitive Ministry of Public Health Resolution 54 — which places restrictions on the emigration of doctors — which hangs like a guillotine over professionals in my profession.

Until now, the Cuban citizen who desires to travel outside of Cuba has to overcome a whole string of obstacles: obtain a “letter of invitation” from a foreign citizen, getting a visa for the country in question, first having deposited thousands of dollars in a bank — a necessary condition for many countries — and then… ah! then… the terrifying “exit permit,” also called the “white card,” that can be issued or denied at will, and which also includes the “entry permit” — awarded by the immigration authorities of the Ministry of the Interior through Decree/Law 989 of December 5, 1961, which says it all.

This has one obvious consequence for Cubans within and outside the island, who for fifty years have been subjected to a tacit ban on travel abroad, because the above-mentioned mechanism functions like a narrow filter, unbreachable by anyone stigmatized for political reasons and especially anyone whom it is suspected might emigrate if given authority to travel. This monster, treacherously rationed, is subject to thousands of acts of extortion, bribery, corruption and moral degradation involving both officials and citizens throughout the country.

But as this is the land of magical realism, a government that has practiced, for so long, this policy of secrecy with regards to travel, has come to the point of cynically questioning the immigration policies of others. They cite repeatedly, for example, the government of the United States for prohibiting its citizens to travel to Cuba as a consequence of the embargo — which is certainly a violation of the rights of the American people — and even convene meetings with the diaspora where they poetically call for “normalization” of relations with emigrants, including, I suppose, those who left Cuba in 1980 under the rain of their blows and tossed eggs.
At these meetings not a word of apology is heard, nor is the need to reform immigration policy even mentioned; convened by the Cuban government, its representatives lash out, throwing stones from their glass house. When I hear news like this I turn off the television, because I was born with only one liver and my tolerance has its limits.

Shielded behind the argument of the “…legitimate defense against the aggressions we’ve been subjected to for more than 50 years…” — perpetrated by successive U.S. administrations, but for which my people bear no fault — the Cuban government lashed out indiscriminately against our freedom and extended this “immigration” war to the rest of the known universe.

Taking as a given that the U.S. administrations certainly haven’t rested, nor will they, in their attempt to overthrow the Revolution, there are still more than 180 other countries with whom Cuba maintains diplomatic relations, consulates, or full trade. This, if there’s no way we can consider ourselves an “enemy” of all humanity, then why don’t we have the right to travel freely in the rest of the world? Why does this ban remain even for countries with “friendly” governments like China, Bolivia, Ecuador and our Venezuelan ally? Why has this sick control been maintained over something so natural? This shows that the sealed-wall policy marks the hard line of a much wider control strategy. Maintaining this strategy fits like a glove with our condition as an archipelago. Our insularity greatly facilitates the wishes of the Cuban government, which has the luxury of trampling rights that it would not be able to monopolize so fully if we had land borders.

Raul added in his speech: “This sensitive issue has been subject to political and media manipulation over many years in an effort to denigrate the Revolution and create enmity with Cubans living abroad.” As if anyone needed to distort anything in relationship to this policy to show exactly what it is: the glaring and massive violation of a right inherent to every home sapiens on the earth. It is not possible to ethically defend such a posture, nor is it necessary exhaust oneself in any kind of “manipulation” to “denigrate” the guilty, because this policy is already, in and of itself, a sufficiently denigrating manipulation to universally discredit anyone who perpetrates it.

Nor was it necessary to “alienate” anyone from the Revolution, because this same policy led to truly bestial treatment of emigrants; it’s enough to remember those shameless repudiation rallies in 1980, the demonization of those who left, the social stigmatization of all those “lumpen” and “worms,” of all that “social scum” dragged through the streets everywhere in Cuba for their “sin” of emigrating, the confiscation of all their property, the total uprooting…

It was this brutality that kept families separated for five decades, and not just residents of “enemy” territory, but every Cuban resident in any country from Manchuria to Patagonia. This policy is at fault, in great measure, for thousands of lives lost at sea in the last two decades, a trail of death that could have been avoided with a policy supporting the natural flow of Cubans through legal means. No one, given a civilized alternative for travel, would have risked ending up adrift with the sharks.

Hopefully, for the good of everyone, sanity will finally be imposed, because once this policy of perpetual imprisonment is eliminated, maintained against the will of the Cuban people, its immediate and visible consequences will end — the illegal trafficking of people across the Gulf, for example — and then time will heal, bit by bit, its generational consequences — which are chronic and so, deeper — at the same time that the Cuban government casts off this serious stigma. For now, one conclusion is clear: “normal relations” cannot exist with immigration as long as there are not normal legal mechanisms that regulate the migratory phenomenon; as long as this isn’t the case every attempt to approach the subject will be a farce, as long as it is not accompanied by sincere political will.

The time has already come in my country when travel can no longer be entertainment earned by a privileged caste, or a gift rewarded uncritical or servile postures, but rather a strictly personal decision, without consultation, not subordinated to the authority of any minister.

Citizens must be left to their own devices, through binding and unequivocal laws that no authority would dare to break. They must guarantee full respect for the individual right and return to the national the wealth of the diaspora, the whole universe of Cubans beyond the sea that has been separated from us for far too long; a universe that in its time included the poetry of Gaston Baquero, the narrative of Cabrera Infante, or the lyrical prose of Reinaldo Arenas; the music of Sandoval and Willy Chirino,Celia’s lost voice that no longer vibrates with Los Van Van in the Piragua; the arms of Duque and Contreras, who don’t throw against their Cuban team, but are excluded from it in the World Baseball Classic; I speak of the generational painting José Bedia and many others, Cubans like me, who make an infinite cosmology that belongs to us. We all fit under the sky of our unique tricolor Cuban nation, but to realize this miracle will require that we forever swear off the doomed Dictionary of Absurd Analogies and admit, finally, that concepts such as travel and renounce, migrate and betray, abdicate and forgive… will never be synonymous.

There remains, however, the sting of uncertainty: In the event that the leadership of the country is certainly thinking about freeing foreign travel without conditions — something I sincerely doubt — will doctors and other professionals be excluded? Will they take “reasonable countermeasures” — words of a rare exoticism among us — or will they to back to the extremes?

Not to fall into sterile speculation, we can only hope. But for now I recover the hope of seeing old friends again, alienated by this wall of discord for over ten years, when they left for new horizons. Because they decided not to live under this government, the doors of their country closed behind them. I say their country, because that sacred spiritual possession that is one’s homeland is always carried within. These, my beloved beings who seek new paths, convince — I already said the most universal of Cubans — that homeland is also humanity.

By Jeovany J. Vega

Source: Translating Cuba

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Cuba: Anti-corruption campaign hits British golf developer

Directly affecting a core player in Cuba’s ambitious golf development plans and a major port expansion, the top executive of a British investment fund was arrested in Havana amid an investigation into alleged corruption.

The Cuban government has not made any announcement regarding the arrest last week in Havana of Amado Fakhre, of Coral Capital Group Ltd.

The arrest, first reported by Reuters, is part of a broadening anti-corruption sweep against Cuban state company executives and the foreign investors they interact with. The move against Coral Capital comes after long prison terms, in absence, for the Chilean owners of Alimentos Río Zaza and a shut-downs of Canadian trading companies Tokmakjian Group and Tri-Star Caribbean.

Cuban company executives receive tiny salaries, while often handling millions of dollars worth of transactions.

According to Reuters, the investigation of Coral Capital apparently centers on the company’s import business in Cuba, not on its plans to build a $120 million golf resort just east of Havana and a $43 million logistics zone at the port of Mariel.

Set up in 1999 and incorporated on the British Virgin Islands, the London-based company has slowly become a strategic player in the Cuban economy. Coral offers trade financing, manages the Laroc Trading Fund, provides brand representation in Cuba, and has invested in plastics bottle manufacturing, as well as film production and other cultural ventures in Cuba. It also spent $28 million on the Saratoga boutique hotel in the historic center of Havana and led the 2006 buyout of the foreign side of the El Senador joint venture hotel on Cayo Coco; that hotel, managed by Iberostar, is undergoing renovation and expected to reopen in winter 2011.

However, Coral may have the biggest impact yet with its plans to build a 1,200-home golf resort at Bellomonte, just 15 miles from the center of the capital. The 628-acre site at Playas del Este, within the city limits of Havana, is anchored by two 18-hole golf courses; plans include a country club, spa, and 323,000 square feet of commercial space. On a separate 20-acre property, Coral plans to build a 160-room beach hotel and beach club.

Bellomonte is one of four golf projects the Cuban government is expected to approve soon, and Coral was planning a construction start of the $120 million first phase for the end of 2012.

In another key project for Cuban economic development, Coral is a partner in a planned $43 million investment in the Mariel logistics zone just west of Havana. Over five years, Coral has produced a master plan with Dubai-based Economic Zones World. The first phase includes 540,000 square feet of warehousing, light industrial plants and offices.

Source: Cubastandard

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Corruption: Cuba shuts Canadian company

Cuba has shut down one of the most important western trading companies in the country as an investigation into alleged corrupt import-export practices broadened to a second Canadian firm, foreign business sources said on Friday.

State security agents on Friday watched who entered the building in Havana's Miramar Trade Center where Ontario-based Tokmakjian Group, one of the top Canadian companies doing business on the communist-run island, has its offices.

The company offices on the fourth floor were sealed with a notice that it had been closed by Cuban State Security.

"We received notice on Monday from the foreign ministry and the Council of State, which is the procedure in such cases, to stop all dealings with the Tokmakjian Group," said an employee of a Cuban company that does business with the firm.

Like other people who spoke to Reuters about the clampdown on the company, she asked that her name not be used.

Tokmakjian Group is estimated to do around $80 million in business annually with the Caribbean island, mainly selling transportation, mining and construction equipment.

The company is the exclusive Cuba distributor of Hyundai, among other brands, and a partner in two joint ventures replacing the motors of Soviet-era transportation equipment.

Company officials were not immediately available for comment.

Cuban authorities shut down Canadian firm Tri-Star Caribbean on July 15 and arrested company president Sarkis Yacoubian. The company, considered a competitor of Tokmakjian Group, did around $30 million in business with Cuba.

"Apparently Tri-Star Caribbean was just the beginning. They brought in more than 50 state purchasers for questioning, arrested some of them and broadened the investigation from there," a western businessman said.

"As far as I know up to now just Canadian firms are involved, but you can bet every state importer and foreign trading company in the country is on edge," he said.

FIGHTING CORRUPTION

Cuban President Raul Castro has made fighting corruption a top priority since taking over for his ailing brother Fidel in 2008, and in the past year a number of Cuban officials and foreign businessmen have been charged in graft cases.

Tri-Star Caribbean did business with around half of the 35 Cuban state companies authorized to import, from tourism, transportation and construction to the nickel and oil industries, communications and public health.

The whereabouts of the man who founded the family business, Cy Tokmakjian, of Armenian heritage, born in Syria and educated in Canada, was not clear on Friday.

He was last seen by Reuters a week ago, the day after his offices were sealed, but another western businessman said he had been detained by Cuban authorities.

"They picked up Cy on Saturday and I heard his wife and at least one of his kids flew in to see what they could do," he said.

Cuba's state-run media rarely reports on corruption related investigations until they are concluded and those charged are sentenced.

Tokmakjian, a former mechanic, is a self-made millionaire with interests in Canada and other countries besides Cuba, where he is a well known figure. He made his first deal with the Caribbean island in 1988.

President Castro, a general who headed Cuba's Defense Ministry for 49 years, has cracked down on corruption as part of his efforts to revive the country's sagging economy, but to date has done little to change the conditions that foster it, such as low salaries and lack of transparency.

There is no open bidding in Cuba's import-export sector and state purchasers who handle multimillion-dollar contracts earn anywhere from $50 to $100 per month.

Castro has moved military officers into key political positions, ministries and export-import businesses and in 2009 established the Comptroller General's Office with a seat on the Council of State.

A source close to the Tri-Star Caribbean case said the Comptroller General's Office had been brought into the investigation, indicating it most likely was targeting high level officials.

Castro's crackdown has resulted in the breaking up of high-level organized graft in the civil aviation, cigar and nickel industries, at least two ministries and one provincial government. An investigation into the communications sector and another into shipping are also under way.

By Marc Frank

Source: The Gazette (Reuters)

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Medicare fraud pays for Cuban spy activities against U.S.

The Communist Cuban dictatorship is draining hundreds of millions of dollars from America's already financially strapped Medicare program and using the money to finance its military and espionage services, according to one counterintelligence expert specializing in Cuban affairs.

In an exclusive interview with International News Analysis Today, Christopher Simmons not only ties in the Cuban dictatorship with the rampant Medicare fraud, but draws a stunning conclusion about the erosion of American sovereignty in south Florida.

Simmons is a retired Counterintelligence Special Agent with 28 years service in the Army, Army Reserve, and the Defense Intelligence Agency with a specialty in Cuban intelligence affairs. Simmons was part of the team that identified, arrested, and convicted former Defense Intelligence Agency senior analyst, Ana Belen Montes, Cuba's highest-ranking spy captured to date. Simmons has appeared on radio and television, and has given testimony before committees of Congress.

Cuban Government As Criminal Enterprise

Medicare fraud usually involves money billed for treatment or services never rendered. Most Medicare fraud in the U.S. occurs in southern Florida, and the majority of the fraud perpetrators flee to Cuba. Law enforcement officials publically state, however, that there is no proof of a connection between Medicare fraud and Cuba.

Ana Belen Montes, 1990.

Simmons pointedly disagrees and does see a clear connection.

"There is a huge difference between proof and evidence," observed Simmons.

"The Cuban government has been a criminal enterprise for 50 years, and has never been reluctant to engage in crime to make money," Simmons declared. Havana has a 50 year history of involvement in breaking international law, from drug trafficking to selling U.S. secrets, Simmons said. He reasons that expansion into a relatively simple scheme as Medicare fraud would be easy for the Communist state.

The Communist Cuban government's wide experience in breaking U.S. and international laws provides "proof of capability and intent" and a "pattern of behavior," Simmons asserted.

In seven out of ten cases, he said, the perpetrators are Cuban-born individuals who have come to the United States since the 1990s and who flee back to Cuba when law enforcement uncover their fraudulent activities. In Cuba, they enjoy every available comfort in return for funneling millions of dollars to the Cuban government.

A report issued by the University of Miami cites statements by a former high-level Cuban intelligence officer indicating that the Cuban government is either directing or assisting the perpetrators to obtain much needed hard currency.

Cuban Official Claims 'Ludicrous'

Cuba officially disclaims any knowledge of either the fraud in south Florida or the presence on the island of the perpetrators of the fraud.

Describing as "ludicrous" Havana's claims of ignorance of the crimes or the criminals. Simmons told INA Today that the newly returned Cuban exiles would have at the very least attracted the attention of members of the Committee for the Defense of the Revolution, a block-by-block organization of Cuban citizen informers whose job it is to watch other Cuban citizens and report everything they see. Simmons estimates that one out of ten Cubans work for the CDR.

Simmons' ratio of informers to citizen is corroborated by what we know about the conditions in the now-defunct Communist East German dictatorship. As many as one in six East Germans were informers for the Ministry for State Security, the feared Stasi secret police.

A returning Cuban exile living the good life in the tropical gulag that is Cuba would certainly attract the attention of the CDR spies across the island.

Fraud Pays for Espionage

Based on his knowledge of previous Cuban government criminal schemes, Simmons stated that a large part of the Medicare fraud profits go directly to support Cuba's vast foreign and domestic spy network and the military.

The United States is Cuba's only important enemy.

The money taken during Cuba's Medicare fraud scheme has returned to south Florida in the person of well-financed intelligence personnel. Simmons stated that from 150 to 200 Cuban intelligence officers are active in south Florida, vastly outnumbering U.S. spy catchers.

Carmen Kaeren González, suspected to be in Cuba

U.S. counterespionage efforts in south Florida are also impeded by the demands of the U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Simmons explained that counterintelligence personnel, because of their experience and training, are often deployed to the Iraq and Afghanistan, because they capable of operating both as intelligence officers — those who seek to obtain restricted or secret information — and in their intended role of counterintelligence personnel — spy catchers.

Florida as 'Denied' Area — Like North Korea

As many as 70% of Cuba's spies operate in south Florida, and the limited number of U.S. counterintelligence personnel available in the region spells potential disaster for the United States.

America's resources available in the struggle against Cuban intelligence are so thin that Simmons regards south Florida as a "denied area," an intelligence designation indicating a place where U.S. intelligence operations "are either difficult or impossible."

Examples of other "denied areas" are North Korea and Iran, said Simmons

The FBI and other law enforcement agencies have scored impressive victories against Cuban intelligence services, among them the destruction of the Wasp Network in 1998 and the arrest of Ana Belen Montes in 2001.

There is much more to do to protect Americas against Cuban espionage activities, but Cuba has become to many influential Americans a politically correct subject. Within the U.S. policy elite there is often a discernible pro-Cuban element.

The U.S. pro-Cuban lobby includes in its ranks U.S. politicians, Hollywood stars, and think tank experts who regularly support Communist Cuba's agenda.

Silence also aids the Cuban dictatorship. Little or nothing is ever said in the U.S. media — liberal or conservative — about the struggles of pro-freedom activists in Cuba who face regular beatings and imprisonment.

Communist Cuba exists because of the relentless oppression carried out by its ruthless secret police for the benefit of the military and the Communist Party. Medicare fraud is just one more crime to add to the many perpetrated against the U.S. and the people of Cuba.

By Toby Westerman

Source: RenewAmerica

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Corruption in Cuba - Telephone executives arrested

ETECSA executives arrested, one defected in Panama. 

A new large-scale corruption scandal involving yet another Cuban government ministry, Informatics and Telecommunications, is unfolding in Havana, reported Reuters.

While no statement has been forthcoming from offical Cuban sources, several executives of ETECSA, Cuba’s monopoly telecommunications company, including its President Maimir Mesa, are under arrest, states Havana based journalist Marc Frank on Tuesday.

Reuters further reported:

“Five or six department directors and deputy directors, and maybe a vice president, have been arrested so far and the vice president of logistics, who was in Panama when the investigation began, decided not to return.”

“But the investigation has just begun and many more people might be involved,” the noted the news agency, adding that a retired company vice president was brought to Havana for questioning.

The sources told Reuters that two separate investigations underway, one at ETECSA, involving its booming cellular phone business, and the other into a submarine fiber optic cable financed largely by Venezuela that links Cuba to that country.

The cable reached Cuba in February but has yet to become operative with the online date pushed back from July to September or October. It is unknown whether the corruption case has anything to do with the failure to meet its widely-touted startup date.

The government of Raul Castro has already prosecuted and sentenced dozens of officials and executives for charges and the president says he will continue to come down hard on abuses found.

Soon after succeeding his ailing brother Fidel in 2008, Castro created the Office of the Comptroller General and put the comptroller on the ruling Council of State.

Hundreds of senior Cuban Communist Party officials, state managers and employees have lost their jobs and often their freedom in the shake-up that has followed.

It has included the breaking up of high-level organized graft in the civil aviation, cigar and nickel industries, and at least two ministries and one provincial government.

Sources: Reuters and Havana Times

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Cuba Aviation & Biotech Execs Off to Prison

At least ten executives in Cuba’s government controlled airline and pharmaceutical industries were sentenced to 3 to 13 prison terms for corruption, announced official sources on Friday.

The accused “received cash and other benefits to favor foreign companies in business transactions” with the Cuban firms they represented, found the court, which also ordered the confiscation of money and goods obtained by the executives in their criminal activity.

Among those punished was Jose Heriberto Prieto, the director of the cargo division of Cubana de Aviación who got 13 years. Jair Rodríguez Martin, former head of exports for the Herber Biotec S.A. Biotech and Pharmaceutical products was given 10 years.

Nonetheless, the deposed president of the Institute of Civil Aeronautics, General Rogelio Acevedo, was not mentioned in the case. He was also absent from sentencing of other officials under his command earlier this year.

Cuba’s President Raul Castro has repeatedly warned that corruption will not be tolerated under his government, struggling to kick-start the country’s depressed economy.

In a recent meeting of the Council of Ministers, Castro said: “Whoever commits a violation, whatever it is, will be brought to task, and to do so our courts, judges and prosecutors will begin to play a more decisive role.”

Cuban political analyst Esteban Morales told IPS that corruption represents an “extraordinary danger” to the country and that “its corrosive power” makes it a matter “of national security.”

By Circles Robinson

Source: Havana Times 

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Cuba: Another Historiography Is Possible

The Presidential Palace, built between 1913-1920. From 1965, the Museum of the Revolution. 

Last Friday, I was talking with a young Honduran historian who was referring to Cuba’s Republican stage (1902-1959). She simplified that period by comparing it to how she sees Panama today: a paradise for gambling and sex but with a government that is failing to provide its citizens a dignified life.

No matter how much revolutionary historiography has attempted to satanize Republican Cuba (attaching it with prefixes like “neo” or “pseudo to the noun “Republic”), it takes an effort to think this way by anyone who values logic and knows something about the history of Cuba.

At least it takes some effort on my part, because for me the Cuban republic was not merely an American backyard for gambling and prostitution. There were also institutions here that for their seriousness and quality earned an esteemed place in the memory of our senior citizens.

These were such that I’ve yet to meet an elderly elementary school teacher who doesn’t speak of their career without concluding with the sentence: “Us, yes, we are true teachers!” in an obvious critique of educators created by the revolutionary government.

That republic of “players and prostitutes” also gave humanity numbers of people of international stature, such as the world champion of chess (Jose Raul Capablanca) and of boxing (“Kid Chocolate”). And I have to say that if Cuba still cannot point to a Nobel Prize winner from that time, it was simply because the sponsors and organizers of that award considered it undue to grant such a distinguished medal to a Latin American.

It’s worth clarifying that despite the fact that the Swedish academy never granted Dr. Carlos J. Finlay the award, it did indeed nominate him for it on at least six occasions. This was an award that he clearly deserved because of his discovery of the Aedes aegypti mosquito as being the transmitting agent of yellow fever, thus saving hundreds of thousands of lives, which in an ironic twist of destiny also facilitated the completion of the Panama Canal.

Another republic quite removed from the casinos and brothels was the one that grouped itself around Cuban intellectuality. Here at least three true erudite circles existed: the liberal, the Catholic and the socialist one, each led by a caliber of intellectuals at the continental level – people such as Jorge Mañach, Jose Lezama Lima and Juan Marinello, each also with their own identity and way of thinking about Cuba.

From their respective political positions, and throughout the entire period of the republic, these cultivated circles that knew how to maintain intense, respectful and enriching dialogues on the issues that affected the nation, a matter that has been excessively downplayed in today’s Cuban academic and cultural panorama.

That republic, which my Honduran friend automatically compared to the worst part of Panama, she also defined as “of little importance” also had one of the most important architecture schools on the continent. This was where architects like Nicolas Quintana (who died recently in Miami), Havana resident Mario Coyula and many others designed and built in barely a half a decade (1953-1958) two of the most emblematic neighborhoods in Havana and in Cuba: Vedado and Miramar.

It goes without saying that this Cuba, so “ill-favored” and full of thugs (according to national historiography), had the first Latin American Olympic champion: fencer Ramon Fonts (1904).

It’s also worth remembering the important role that Cuba would play in the technological development of the region. The first Latin American airborne journey was carried out by a Cuban, Agustin Parla. The 1913 flight lasted almost three hours as that pilot traveled between Cayo Hueso (U.S.A.) and the town of the Mariel, west of Havana.

Even rights such as divorce — so trying and difficult to understand for sexist Ibero-Americans at the beginning of the 20th century — was accepted in our country as early as 1918.

In terms of other women’s rights, the first feminist movement in Ibero-America appeared at the end of the 1930’s in Cuba, thirty-six years ahead of the movement in Spain, for example.

Other important facts that my friend should know is that in 1937 Cuba decreed, for the first time in Ibero-America, laws for the eight-hour work day, the minimum wage and university autonomy.

In 1940 a constitution was adopted which was the first one in Ibero-America that approved the right of women to vote, equal rights for different sexes and races, and women’s right to work.

In 1951 the Riviera Hotel became the first in the world to have central air conditioning.

In terms of our agrarian culture, my friend should also know that in 1954 Cuba succeeded in producing one head of cattle for each resident, with the Cuban population back then numbering around six million people.

It would also be worthwhile to recognize that in 1956 the UN recognized Cuba as the number two country in Latin America in terms of its literacy index, with its illiterate population consisting of only 23.6 percent – well above Spain’s illiterate population of 60 percent.

In 1957 Cuba was recognized by the UN as the leading Ibero-America country in terms of its number of doctors per capita (1 for every 957 residents).

In 1958 Cuba ranked as the second country of the world in the percentage of households with color television and it was the third in the world to establish a color TV station.

In 1958 Cuba was the Ibero-American country with the most automobiles (160,000, or one for each 38 residents).

I also feel it my duty to tell my friend that in 1959, Havana led the world by being the city with the most movie theaters (358), even surpassing cities like New York and Paris.

In conclusion, I would like to let my friend know that I don’t have anything personal against our fine Panamanian sisters and brothers, nor do I believe that she does. Still, I would like to know if she still thinks the same after this brief review of the data on the Cuban Republic.

Alfredo Fernandez Rodriguez

Source: Havana Times 

Related: Clouds in my Cuban coffee 

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Corruption in Cuba - Greed or just survival?

Corruption. Unfortunately it’s a way of life in Cuba due to the failure of Communism and a centrally controlled economy. 

A visit to the Black Market is an every day event for most Cubans so they can “resolve” the challenges of living in Cuba. When you see the word “resolve” used in this way, it means to borrow (and never return) something, usually from the government.

Three generations of Cubans have lived this way. Couple this with the “go along to get along” mentality in order to stay out of trouble in Cuba and there is little reason to wonder why there is corruption in Cuba.

Everyone is careful not to “resolve” too many problems or too be too successful or too openly critical of the government or to be too corrupt but, cross the invisible, moving line and you are arrested. You are removed from your state job and even your family may suffer in one way or another by losing their job, a promotion or some other perk from the cradle-to-grave Cuban social security/free healthcare/free education system.

I just read Cuba: Catching Kleptocrats by Nick Miroff from Global Post.

He writes “As part of his economic reform push, Castro wants to give more independence to Cuba’s state companies and local governments, freeing them from the need to obtain Havana’s permission for every little decision and expenditure. But a series of corruption scandals among Cuban executives in recent months has been a reminder as to how the island’s state-run economy got so centralized in the first place. As soon as the government eases up its controls, company managers steeped in graft tend to get even greedier.”

Manuel Garcia - Habanos

Manuel García, Habanos’s commercial vice-president has been in jail since August 2010. He and ten of his staff also face corruption trials for allegedly accepting bribes in exchange for selling Cuban cigars at a discount to black market distributors.

Rogelio Acevedo - Cubana

Nick goes on to write “Rogelio Acevedo, the country’s former top aviation official, was arrested last year for allegedly running a side business that chartered jets of the national airline, Cubana de Aviacion, for outrageous personal profit. There are also new reports this week that executives in the country’s lucrative nickel-processing industry are in custody and facing corruption charges.”

Alejandro Roca - Food Ministry

As reported in Granma (the “you read what we want you to read newspaper), Roca has been sentenced to fifteen years in prison after being found guilty of several crimes “continuously accepting bribes and acts harmful to economic activity”.

Max Marambio - Chilean businessman

Friend of Fidel Castro, Chilean businessman Max Marambio was sentenced to twenty years in prison for the crimes of accepting bribes, fraud, and falsification of bank or trade documents with regards to his Rio Zaza company. The crimes committed were particularly grave and required a vigorous legal response, in correspondence with the extensive damage to the national economy. This trial was connected to the Roca trial. Both men were convicted in absentia. There was no mention as to why Roca was not present.

Pedro Alvarez - Alimport and Cuba Chamber of Commerce

Pedro Alvarez, former President of the purchasing agency Alimport who then moved (or was moved) to the Cuban Chamber of Commerce is under investigation for alleged corruption. It has been reported that he was detained several times by the Technical Investigations Department in Havana.

Summary

In April 2010, Esteban Morales, said some top Cuban officials are preparing to divide the spoils if Cuba’s political system disintegrates. He continued “In reality, corruption is much more dangerous than so-called internal dissent,” Morales wrote in the piece, which appeared on the Web site of the state National Artists and Writers Union of Cuba. “The latter is isolated ... but corruption is truly counterrevolutionary because it comes from within the government and the state apparatus, which are the ones that really control the country’s resources.”

In November 2010 we heard from a source who believes that many of these charges may be “inflated” and targeted against people loyal to Fidel Castro. In other words, there is speculation that Raul Castro is removing anyone loyal to Fidel. As many know, Carlos Lage and Felipe Perez Roque were removed from office for being seduced by the “honey of power”.

So, today, maybe Raul is done cleaning house or maybe the new economic opening is seducing more government officials to be corrupt or maybe the Cuban government is looking harder for corrupt officials. The Global Post article is wrapped up this way “Cuba’s Comptroller General Office’s is currently engaged in an audit of 750 state companies, sending 3,000 investigators to look into “all sectors, all organizations and territories” and evaluate “discipline, legality and economic control,” Comptroller General Gladys Bejerano announced on state television last month. So more managers may fall in the coming weeks.”

Life in Cuba is the definition for “Damned if you do and damned if you don’t”.

Rob Sequin 

Source: Havana Journal

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Chilean businessman, ex-minister get long-term sentences

Max Marambio (l) and Castro in the "friendship" times.

Ending a one-year trial, a provincial court in Havana sentenced a former food industry minister and a Chilean investor to long prison terms.

A report in Granma said ex Food Industry Minister Alejandro Francisco Roca Iglesias must serve 15 years, after the court convicted him in March of “repeated bribery” and “acts to harm economic activity,” while Max Marambio, who was sentenced in absence, must serve 20 years on convictions of bribery, fraud and falsification.

In both cases, the court followed the guidance of prosecutors.

Marambio, via his Twitter account from Chile, denounced the sentencing as “pure political persecution” and challenged the Cuban government to ask a Chilean court for his extradition. “They never sent anything,” he wrote.

He was represented by a court-appointed defender. The political insider-turned-businessman and long-time resident of Cuba has not returned to the island since fall 2009. He filed legal proceedings against Cuba before the court of arbitration of the Paris-based International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) in October 2010.

The Havana court’s ruling can be appealed before the Superior Court within 10 days.

Neither did the Granma article provide any details of the allegations, nor has there been any other official information as to what the pair’s alleged crimes actually consisted of.

“The charges of the prosecution were duly proven, and [the court] took into account that the crimes committed are of particular seriousness, requiring an energetic response for punishment that corresponds to the many damages to the national economy caused by the accused, to the detriment of the ethical behavior of various officials and subordinated workers,” Granma said, without explaining details.

Marambio claims part of the accusations stem from his paying generous benefits to Cuban employees. According to Chilean press reports, Roca is accused of making considerable bank deposits abroad from illicit commissions. A son of Roca’s works for Marambio in Chile.

The sentencing puts an end to a two-year investigation and trial that prompted broad media coverage in Chile. It comes on the heels of several cases of destitution and investigation against state company executives, most recently the imprisonment of a long-term executive at cigar company Habanos S.A. on corruption charges.

Roca Iglesias.

Roca Iglesias, 75, was minister of food industries from 1976 to March 2009. He lost his minister job the same time as Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque and Vice President Carlos Lage.

Marambio, 63, made it into Cuba’s inner circles of power under Fidel Castro. The former student leader in Chile and body guard of President Salvador Allende fled to Cuba after the 1973 coup, where he became a member of Cuba’s special forces, and founding chief executive of the CIMEX holding — today Cuba’s largest business conglomerate. In the 1990s, he used his close relationship with the Cuban government to build a thriving business, the Havana-based Alimentos Río Zaza joint venture. Early last year, the government shut down Río Zaza, which produced and sold processed food products in Cuba to the tune of $100 million a year, and took back Marambio’s house in Havana.

As of October, two Río Zaza executives were imprisoned in relation to the investigation, according to Marambio; the government hasn’t released any information about related cases.

Source: Cuba Standard

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CUBA: Preparing For Perestroika

El Capitolio, or National Capitol Building in Havana, Cuba.

Dividing Old Havana from Chinatown is Cuba’s Capitolio Nacional, a monumental edifice with a fateful past. El Capitolio was conceived during the Roaring ’20s, when the island led the world in sugar exports and the future seemed sky blue.

President Gerardo Machado dreamed of turning Cuba into the Switzerland of the Americas. He decided that his 4 million countrymen needed a domed capitol building even taller and more ornate than the one he toured in Washington. So Cuba’s Congress dutifully poured 3% of the country’s GDP into their new home. (This would be akin to the US Congress spending $420 billion for a new office today, but let’s not give them any ideas…)

It took 8,000 skilled Cuban laborers just three years to complete El Capitolio, which featured gilt ceilings, a giant diamond embedded into the pristine marble floor and the world’s third-largest indoor statue. However, the showy project couldn’t have been more poorly timed. Work completed in 1929, just as America’s stock market crashed and the Great Depression unfolded.

The Smoot-Hawley tariffs crushed Cuban sugar prices by 74%. When El Capitolio’s ribbon was cut in 1931, Cuba’s economy lay in tatters. Machado was forced out of office, and his dream building would perform congressional service for only 28 years before Fidel Castro’s revolutionaries swept into Havana and opted for more austere premises. I don’t need to recite the history from here, which you probably well know.

The winds of change are gathering in Cuba, though. Since Fidel Castro’s health nearly failed in 2006, power has passed to his younger brother, Raul Castro. Raul has quietly reshuffled more than 30 cabinet members to prepare his party and people for a sweeping economic policy overhaul – Perestroika al Cubano. Even the semi-retired Fidel seems to have glumly accepted that change is inevitable, candidly admitting to a visiting US journalist that “the Cuban model doesn’t even work for us anymore.”

The global economic crisis whacked Cuba hard. Venezuela cut back on its largesse as its own economy worsened. Tourism and remittances softened, while nickel export prices tanked. Furthermore, three severe hurricanes left a wake of destruction in 2008. Unable to service Cuba’s estimated $21 billion foreign debt, and running out of generous leftist patrons to hit up, Raul Castro has, apparently, decided he has little choice but to pry open Cuba’s economy.

Castro’s wild card is Cuba’s oil and gas reserves. The island currently produces 60,000 bbl a day. But its US-facing northern waters hold an estimated 5-20 billion barrels of oil and 20 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. (Note: This compares with 29 billion barrels of oil reserves in the entire US.) Accessing this undersea oil requires the sophisticated drilling technology the US excels in. But as long as sanctions remain in place, the US oil majors are excluded from that bonanza. Amidst the applause of oil industry lobbyists, the dance for reengagement has begun, with both partners taking some unprecedented steps.

Raul Castro has issued a far-reaching five-year road map for Cuba’s future economic reform. The proposed changes would put Cuba on a very similar path to that taken by China in the 1980s and Vietnam in the 1990s. Here are some of the ideas: permit real estate transactions amongst Cubans, merge the two-tier currency system, close down inefficient state enterprises, decentralize state ownership, facilitate private ownership of businesses, distribute idle land to farmers, open state-owned wholesale markets and further encourage foreign investment – particularly in tourism.

In recent months, some planned reforms have already been implemented in an effort to delay Cuba’s impending insolvency. Costly subsidies on sugar and personal care products are being scaled back. The government announced plans to shed 500,000 state workers (that’s 10% of the country’s government work force in a country where 85% of workers work for the state) and guide them somehow into the private sector.

Cubans are being encouraged to grow and sell their own fruits and vegetables. The government is inviting foreign investors to develop 10 golf course estates in Cuba, with a new law allowing 99-year land leases to foreign buyers of plots in such projects. In the old days of Fidel’s revolution, such policies were unthinkable.

So what is the potential for a liberalized Cuban economy?

Just look 90 miles across the straits to Florida. A million Cuban-Americans call Miami home. Cuba has 60% of Florida’s population and 80% of its landmass, but greater natural resources and a much longer coastline, so one might conclude that the two are of comparable overall potential.

Perhaps to underscore their similarities, remember the fact that England and Spain cleanly swapped the two in 1763. Today, Florida’s economy is 12 times larger than Cuba’s. One reason is that Florida gets 20 times as many tourists as Cuba, plus an inflow of affluent retirees.

When the US government stops restricting its citizens from traveling to Cuba, the island will become an instant tourist magnet. Offering short flights, sunny beaches, cool music, “old world” architecture and cheap surgery, Cuba should have no problem drawing several million American tourists a year, as further-away destinations like Costa Rica have done.

Should reforms become comprehensive enough, agriculture seems an obvious investment play: Half the land is arable, labor is cheap and rain is plentiful. Cuba’s once-vaunted sugar industry stands in disarray, with 80% of the old mills shut down. However, today’s high sugar prices provide ample incentive to revive the sector, along with other traditional crops such as cigar tobacco.

Despite its long coastline, fisheries and aquaculture remain largely overlooked. Cuba is a world-class producer of nickel, but other mineral deposits remain underexploited. And then there’s the oil. The entire power system needs to be updated, financial services developed, retailing expanded – the opportunities seem endless.

Beyond the subsidized basics, most consumer goods have to be imported, and imports draw heavy duties. Telecom services are costly due to government monopolization and inefficiency. The list goes on. In this environment, it is tough for most Cubans to get by unless they receive remittances, tourist gratuities or tea money.

All in all, we eagerly await the implementation of Cuba’s economic reforms. As this process unfolds, Cuba could transform into one of the world’s most attractive frontier investment destinations. America has a long track record of turning bitter rivals into productive partners (a recent example being Vietnam), and re-engagement with Cuba could be one of Obama’s most notable foreign policy legacies.

Some frontier investors are not waiting for that and are already investing in Cuba. While 100% foreign ownership is permitted, most investors enter joint ventures with Cuban state enterprises, which typically contribute land, labor and sometimes capital. Over 250 such joint ventures exist, mostly for specific sectors or projects. Investments are made in foreign currency, eliminating exchange rate issues, and there are no restrictions on capital repatriation. Corporate income tax is 30% for joint ventures and 35% for wholly owned foreign companies, but tax holidays of five-seven years are available.

A few Cuba-focused investment groups have been established that non-US investors can access. Canada-listed Sherritt Group is a major player in Cuban nickel mining and, formerly, telecoms. A private investment group backed by European investors, Coral Capital has restored Havana’s historic Saratoga Hotel, which was recently ranked by Conde Nast as the 16th best hotel in the world. Coral is now planning a number of golf courses, marina, housing and hotel projects, as is Leisure Canada, a Canada-listed investment vehicle.

Douglas Clayton

Source: Business Insider

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Castro vs Batista

Castro to Batista: "Are we there yet?"

Fifty-two years into the Revolution, Fidel Castro will have achieved all the failings, real and perceived, that Cuba had under Batista, and it will have retained few of the virtues.

Over at the Museo de la Revolucion, Fidel Castro's case against the dictator he overthrew 52 years ago is vividly on display.

Fulgencio Batista was evil incarnate, the museum earnestly instructs visitors in room after room of the once-magnificent building, formerly a presidential palace built in 1920 and decorated by Tiffany's of New York. Under Batista and his predecessors, we learn through photos and text, Cuba became a playground for crass tourists who came for sex, drink and gambling, and who crowded the country's pristine beaches to the detriment of ordinary folk. To drive home the immorality of pre-socialist times, the museum displays an original National Lottery of Cuba ticket from early in the century, a symbol of the country's fall from grace.

We learn that Batista was an illegitimate leader, the election he won stolen by manipulating the press. Worse, Batista intimidated, even jailed or killed, political opponents.

But Batista also failed Cuba by failing to invest government funds wisely. One damning display berates Batista's priorities with a list of budget line items that show government expenditures on frills such as roads, promenades and buildings. Batista's sky-high spending on telecommunications - which the display dubs as military - comes in for criticism. Another display lambastes Batista for failing to diversify the economy. Another still, which provides a year-by-year report of sugar output, accuses Batista of neglecting this all-important industry. The numbers show a downward trend, interrupted with some up-ticks, in the 1950s, and then a giant leap forward, as Castro mobilized the country to produce more sugar in one of his regime's grand economic plans.

The moral and economic rot under Batista led to humiliation and human tragedy, the museum tells us. "Many women who were denied jobs saw themselves forced to become prostitutes in order to survive," said one display. Said another: "According to a census in 1953, there were 200,000 shacks and misery huts." Said a third, also referring to the 1953 census: "40,939 people died due to lack of medical attendance and unsanitary living conditions."

The history the museum imparts is part truth, part fiction and all hypocrisy. Batista was indeed an unsavory character. He did oversee a corrupt administration in Cuba. He did undermine the halting democracy that the United States helped create after liberating Cuba from oppressive Spanish occupation at the turn of the century.

But Cuba and its U.S.-style constitution was also an economic powerhouse with potent social institutions and impressive accomplishments. A 1958 United Nations report ranked Cuba's vibrant free press eighth in the world, and first in Latin America. Despite its much smaller population, Cuba had 160 radio stations compared to the U. K.'s 62 and France's 50. It had 23 television stations compared to Mexico's 12 and Venezuela's 10. The tiny country supported 58 newspapers, fourth in Latin America behind populous Mexico, Brazil and Argentina.

Raul Castro (r), now the President of Cuba, in the hands of Fulgencio Batista (around 1938).

Cuba once installed telephones at a rapid rate. No more. It once ranked first in Latin America, fifth in the world, in television sets per capita, and also ranked high in radios, automobiles, and many other consumer goods. No more. With the population increased and the housing stock degraded, more people suffer inadequate housing today than ever before, and sanitary conditions have become a scandal through much of the country.
 
The information-hungry populace in the Batista era was well-educated, as it remains. Student registration at primary schools in 1955 was 1,032 students per 10,000 inhabitants, higher than the figures for 1990 of 842. The registration rate for higher education was an impressive 38 per 10,000, about the same as it was 10 years later (34 per 10,000) and 15 years later (41 per 10,000). The country, in fact, had a long history of high literacy levels: At the turn of the 20th century, only 28% of those 10 and over couldn't read or write, not that different from the current figure, 100 years later, of 16%.

But unlike today, Cuba's economy under Batista was powerful, both domestically and in exports, and it was becoming increasingly diversified. Under Castro, its economy is in tatters, nowhere more so than in the sugar industry that Castro once promoted so heavily. A few years ago, Castro announced a shut down of half of the country's sugar mills. "We had to act or face ruin," he explained. As he told NBC News at the time. "It cost us more to produce sugar than what we could sell it for."

But if Batista bested Castro in virtually every broad socio-economic indicator, he paled in comparison when it came to controlling either the electoral process or the populace. Castro executed thousands of political opponents after he came to power, imprisoned tens of thousands and caused hundreds of thousands to flee to exile. Where Batista won a disputed election, a Castro election leaves no room for dispute: Castro allows no opponents, no opposing viewpoints to appear in the press, and, because that might not be enough, his political machine ensures a good turnout by keeping tabs on who votes and who doesn't: In the 2003 national election, Castro managed a 90%-plus "yes" vote, not quite as impressive as Saddam Hussein's 100% but, among dictators, respectable enough.

Those who revile Batista often point to a decadent economy that relied on mafia-run casinos, prostitution and other demeaning jobs servicing tourists. Tourism was important under Batista - Havana was an east-coast alternative to Las Vegas, complete with the sex and gaming, and the same mafia owners - but never as important as tourism has become today. Cuba's once diversified economy is gone and Castro is now putting all of his hopes in attracting tourists.

To do this, Castro's Cuba now permits prostitution, it winks at sex tourism - tourist guide books even include sections on the country's once-taboo gay and bisexual scenes - and, as under Batista, the country unabashedly invests heavily in tourism. In 2003, Castro inaugurated a US$100-million resort on the island's northeastern coast, broadcast nationwide, to underscore the importance the government places on the new five-hotel complex of 944 rooms able to house 1,500 tourists.

Tourism is now Cuba's No. 1 source of foreign income, with 1.6 million visitors generating about US$2-billion in 2002. More tourists come from Canada than from other important sources of foreign exchange, chiefly Germany, Britain, Italy, France, and Switzerland. Castro, like Batista, is eyeing one other important tourist market.

"Our friends from the north are not in this list," Castro said once with a grin, referring to Americans that can't travel to Cuba due to U.S. government regulations.

Some day soon, perhaps, Castro's dream may be realized, and Cuba's economy may once again benefit from U.S. tourism. If it does, Cuba under Castro will have recovered one of the benefits that the country once enjoyed. Fifty-two years into the Revolution, Castro will have achieved all the failings, real and perceived, that Cuba had under Batista, and it will have retained few of the virtues.

Updated from an article by Larry Solomon in the Capitalism Magazine

Some images from Cuba before 1959  

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Gambling and the Law: Cuba will have casinos, again

Casino Plaza in Cuba, destroyed in 1959.

President Obama has just announced that he is easing restrictions on visits to Cuba; the second time he will be relaxing travel rules imposed on Americans by Pres. George W. Bush.

Casual tourism is still difficult, but it will be much easier for students and teacher, religious groups and journalists to request permission to visit Cuba. He had already made it easier for Cuban-Americans to travel to see relatives on the island.

Although the State Department takes the position that tourists cannot legally travel to Cuba, my reading of the statutes is a little different. To obey federal laws, all U.S. citizens have to do is not spend any money whatsoever once they set foot on the island.

But that law will have to be changed. Because Cuba will have casinos within the next 10 years.

Or, more accurately, Cuba will again have casinos. Because during the 1950s the island nation, less than 100 miles from Florida, was one of the leading gaming and tourist destinations of the world.

It started in the 1920s, when Havana assumed a role later taken by Las Vegas: a vacation spot where Americans could party in ways not allowed at home. But it was not the gambling as much as it was the booze. America was in the midst of the disastrous experiment known as Prohibition, which also created modern organized crime. Cuba flourished with nightclubs, bordellos and casinos.

World War II was a minor interruption. Then the partying was reborn. Havana became so notorious, that in 1950 a Broadway musical, "Guys and Dolls," could be built around its reputation. The audience knew why Nathan Detroit (the Frank Sinatra character in the 1955 film) bet Sky Masterson (Marlon Brando) that Sky could not convince the Salvation Army "doll" (Jean Simmons) to go with him for "dinner in Havana."

But it looked for a while like the good times might be coming to an end. Cuban casinos had become so crooked that Americans were beginning to stay away. They were saved when Fulgencio Batista became dictator in 1952.

In an ironic twist, Batista called upon the mob, particularly Meyer Lansky, to clean things up. And they did. It is hard to believe organized crime syndicates would run completely honest games. But Lansky realized they could make more money with magnificent hotel-casinos then if they cheated everyone.

Throughout the 1950s, the American and Cuban mob families opened luxurious casino resorts, each one bigger and more successful than the last. The money poured in. Batista got a cut of everything.

Three recent books, Offshore Vegas: How the Mob Brought Revolution to Cuba; Havana Before Castro: When Cuba was a Tropical Playground (great photos); and Havana Nocturne: How the Mob Owned Cuba and Then Lost It to the Revolution (being made into a movie), may overstate the importance of organized crime in the Communists coming to power.

The economy under Batista was not that bad. Cuba had a large middle class. Lansky was, in fact, originally reluctant to open casinos, because labor unions were so strong.

Still, most Cubans never shared the wealth they saw all around them, and corruption was rampant. The result was revolution.

When news hit the streets on New Year's Day, 1959, that Batista had fled the country, angry crowds poured into the casinos, destroying everything inside.

As one of his first decrees, Fidel Castro outlawed gambling. He then tried to reopen some, with untrained dealers, after he discovered how important the casinos were to the local economy. But it was too late the American patrons were gone.

The Soviet bloc never could supply enough tourists to make up for being isolated from the U.S. I remember seeing faded posters for Havana vacations in a tourist bureau in Prague, shortly after the Velvet Revolution. But the other store windows were practically empty, since there was little to buy and few people had any money, or the right to fly over the barbed wire and minefields that had surrounded Communist Czechoslovakia.

The fall of the Iron Curtain shows what we can expect for Cuba: A combination of two of the greatest expansions of legal gaming in the last 40 years.

The dissolution of the Soviet Union and the replacement of communism with capitalism lead to an explosion of casinos throughout Eastern Europe and Russia.

And the death of the dictator Francisco Franco led to an explosion of slot machines and other legal gaming throughout Spain.

Although Franco was strongly anti-communist, the comparison with Castro is apt. The Iberian peninsula and Latin America have a long tradition of strongmen, "caudilhos" in Portuguese, in Spanish "caudillos." Franco ruled from 1936 to 1975, and even called himself "Caudillo de España, por la gracia de Dios;" which Wikipedia translates as "Leader of Spain, by the grace of God."

Castro has been the caudillo since 1959, first as Prime Minister, then President and now as First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba. Due to illness, he turned over much of his power to his younger brother Ra?l, on July 31, 2006.

Raúl has shown some independence. He doesn't really have what it takes to be a caudillo. So he might start true liberalization as soon as the sickly Fidel, 84 years old, dies. Raúl is 79, so both Castro brothers will probably be gone within the next 10 years.

The caudillo tradition seems to be coming to an end. The U.S. will drop its economic embargo when democracy and capitalism come to Cuba, in whatever form they take. In fact, as we know from Macau, democracy is not the essential part of the equation. China is still Marxist, but it is hard to call it communist.

The initial breakthrough will probably take place on cruise ships, with casinos, returning to the Port of Havana. Initially, gaming will only be permitted on the high seas. But it is a short step from there to allowing the casinos to be open while the ships are docked.

Bingo machines are sweeping Latin America. These are often called Class II. Of course, there is no Class I or Class III, since the categories were created by, and apply only to, the U.S. Indian Gaming Regulatory Act. But, it is an easy way to distinguish these gaming devices from true slot machines, at least for political cover.

True casinos, with true slots and table games, are also common in much of Central and South America. But even more so in the Caribbean. A free Cuba will quickly allow casinos to reopen, in high-quality hotels designed for, and possibly even limited to, tourists.

So, I'm inviting you to G2E-IGE Havana, 2011. Given the consolidation of every part of the gaming industry, I have taken the liberty of predicting the merger of the two largest trade shows, the Global Gaming Expo, now held in Las Vegas, and the International Gaming Expo, in London.

And the conference venue should be magnificent. Castro's Communist regime may have accidentally contributed something else to the speedy rebirth of casinos. There has been so little economic progress on the island, that apparently the ornate buildings constructed in the 1950s to house the mob's casinos are still standing, waiting to be refurbished and reopened, under new management.

By I. Nelson Rose

From: Casino City Times

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A new dawn for Cuba as capitalism eclipses communism

Communism has nothing to offer to Cubans.

The party begins to pop at about midnight when the half-naked male models point the last stragglers to the open roof top.

On a second level above us under the stars the DJ turns it down briefly to allow a solo trumpeter to play a sensuous salsa serenade while behind the bar – as long as a swimming pool and sagging with mojito cocktails – lesbian porn from the nineteen thirties is projected on an bare wall.

The guests, in from Sao Paolo, Mexico City, Paris and Madrid, take it in their sophisticated stride, navigating past mattresses for the boozed up and the louche and feigning insouciance as Oscar-winning actor Benicio Del Toro brushes past. There had been a clue in the invitation about what was to come. Dress code: "tropical glam".

Yet there is wonder if not actual shock in their smiles even as they dance their last dance and surrender to the approaching Caribbean dawn. We are not in Miami, Palm Beach or even Los Angeles. This is Havana, home to one of the last Soviet-style regimes in the world. Now in the lift going back down an impossible rumour goes around. Two of Raul Castro's sons attended the party. You never saw them?

Cuba is changing. The roof-garden fete, with its decadent pulse, was not something you see in Havana on your average Saturday night. Some may have thought of it as an aberrant flashback to the pre-revolution days when frolicsome behaviour was the norm. But to others it seemed like a back-to-the-future experience. Was this a glimpse of this grand but crumbling city 10 or 20 years from now, raring once again for fun? A reporter meanwhile tries to straighten out those Castro sightings. The surprise: no sons but two grand-daughters had indeed shown up.

Grandfather Raul, who turns 80 this year four years after taking over as President from his ailing brother and founder of the revolution, Fidel, will not have given the party a second's thought. That Cuba is tiptoeing back into the sunlight is of his own personal doing, after all. It was last September that a stunned nation as told that the centrally planned economy was dying and needed radical surgery. By the end of this April, the government decreed, 500,000 Cubans would have been fired from state jobs. In the longer term, the Raul-sanctioned plan would eliminate about 1 million jobs, or roughly 20 per cent of the workforce.

It is an audacious blueprint that will kill the socialist model erected by Fidel and his co-revolutionary Che Guevara 53 years ago or save it from collapse. Its success or failure will depend largely on whether Cuba, with its epic inefficiencies and laid-back rhythms, can rediscover long-suppressed capitalist instincts. Today, the state employs almost 90 per cent of all workers. As many of those are now laid off they will be encouraged to apply for licenses to try their hand at private enterprise. Fidel did something similar 15 years ago, but on a far tinier scale – Havana saw the opening of a handful of family-run restaurants and hostelries for tourists – and he later backed away. This promises to be much bigger.

What it means is that Cuba is in a state of high agitation. Interviews over several days with Cubans of all backgrounds suggested a people uncertain whether to be deeply afraid of what is coming or grateful that after decades of stagnation, their leaders finally are ready for reform. And there have been other signs of movement from the top. In February, the regime with little fanfare lifted the internet firewall that for years had blocked much of what Cubans could see on the web (though only a fraction of the population has access to it). And the months since last July have seen 60 political prisoners released, all originally rounded up in the so-called 'Black Spring' of 2003. Only seven of those arrested in that crackdown now remain behind bars.

Miguel Barnet, the President of the Writers' and Artist's Union, an amiable man about Havana who has a direct line of communication with the Castros (and is therefore not free to speak entirely candidly), accepted that Cuba is in a tricky place but was certain that Raul knows what he's doing. "I am very optimistic for Cuba," he tells me. "What would be tricky is if there was no transition going on. We need to do this."

Raul has support from other members of the top communist leadership. Next month, a Communist Party Congress will be convened, something not seen in a decade and a half. It will approve the full Raul reforms that not only will significantly broaden the areas in which free enterprise will be tolerated and even encouraged but – perhaps most surprising and risky – will simultaneously introduce a system of income tax.

We also know, however, that resistance has been powerful at the next level of communist leaders – the ones who have to choose who is to lose their jobs and then tell them. Sources spoke of uproar one recent night at the luxury, state-operated Melia Cobiba Hotel when top socialist officials gathered the staff of 580 people and told them only 480 would be returning the following day.

In an attempt at consultation and fairness, committees were established to discuss how the lay-offs might work. Their work was concluded last weekend and on Monday Raul acknowledged that progress on sacking the first 500,000 workers had been slow. The end-April deadline, he said, would therefore be extended. He gave no new clear schedule for reaching his final goals.

Speculation abounds that he may also be slowing the pace because of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and other countries in the Middle East where citizens have risen up against authoritarian regimes. However, Cuba is different. It does not have a youth-heavy population, access to sites like Twitter and Facebook is extremely limited and there is no issue of corruption or great displays of wealth among the ruling elite. "We write to our capitals every day and say it is not going to happen in Cuba," says one junior diplomat at the Canadian embassy here. "Change is going to come not at once, but bit by bit."

Then there is this: while the prisoner release programme has cheered human rights groups and even some dissident leaders in the country, no one supposes that old habits of repression have died. Thus two weeks ago, on the first anniversary of the death from hunger strike while behind bars of dissident Orlando Zapata Tamayo, the regime moved temporarily to round up 45 dissidents and confine 60 more in their homes to diminish the chances of street protests. All were released when the anniversary was over.

"Some positive steps have been taken," a diplomatic source in Havana said, noting the release of the 60 political prisoners. "But we remain extremely worried about the human rights situation." He described a security apparatus that remained alert and ubiquitous. Any kinds of street gatherings are instantly quashed, in part by thugs hired by the state. The front page of the Communist Party paper, Granma, last week reported that the spokesperson for the Ladies in White, a protest group of wives and relatives of those first incarcerated in 2003, had been unveiled as a government informer. What motivated the paper to run this is unclear.

The United States, which maintains its 49-year-old economic embargo although restrictions on sending money and travelling to Cuba have been eased by President Barack Obama, has its own human rights crisis with Cuba, involving US citizen Alan Gross, 61, who was to go on trial in Havana yesterday. Caught distributing satellite reception equipment to Jewish groups in Cuba to improve their access to the internet, he was arrested on charges of espionage and could face 20 years in jail if convicted. The US has protested and demanded his release.

The embargo is a big part of what ails Cuba, which was kept afloat for years by Moscow until the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989. The other problem is the lack of liquidity in Cuba, where no system of credit exists. Meet Jose, for example, who for years worked as a carpenter before – in the Cuban equivalent of winning the lottery – landed a job last year driving a tourist horse-drawn buggy in Old Havana on a monthly salary of $11 that is multiplied many times over by tips. With two of his four sons along with him, he acknowledges that he risks being fired under Raul's reforms. "We will deal with that if it comes," he says, before revealing an ambition to open a paladar – the name of the private restaurants permitted to serve tourists: "I will be the waiter and my wife will cook." But he echoes the worries many others have.

"The pillars of our country are all gone – coffee, sugar, rum – they aren't good any more," laments Fran, 66, once a farm labourer who now earns $4 a month as cabaret singer for the state aviation institute. He too is lucky as the holder of one of Fidel's original licenses to entertain tourist groups. He sings old Beatles' numbers at a creaking paladar on a river outside Havana. Fran tells me something that would be hard to credit were we not in Cuba where nothing seems too bizarre. He claims his son Ojani was married in the early 1990s to Jennifer Lopez. "I told him not to worry about the money and just leave," he says with a smile of obvious chagrin. He is pessimistic about the Raul reforms. "So, the people will be allowed to work for themselves and have their own business. Yes, fine. But how do you that without any money? We have no savings."

"It will all come from Miami," says a US businessman who has permitted business dealings in Cuba. In spite of the embargo, the US is Cuba's fifth trading partner. This is why the relaxation of the rules on money remittances to Cuba by Obama are seen by some as crucial, because those dollars may fuel the nascent free enterprise sector.

Few in Cuba, however, expect the embargo to end soon and most react sceptically to the idea that when Fidel dies, Uncle Sam will come with dollars and cruise ships and take the island for itself. "I don't think that the Americans want another mortgage," says Mr Barnet, the union leader. "We have to do this for ourselves."

More important now, with the Communist Congress around the corner, is if ordinary Cubans think it can be done. That they want to have faith is clear and they don't need rooftop parties to feel the breeze of possible change. But the gap between Raul's promises and free enterprise taking root is wide and fear still reigns over hope. "This," says a diplomat "is their last chance, because the country is in dire shape."

By David Usborne

From: Belfast Telegraph

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