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 To Promote Foreign Investment

Cuba in future will be a country that promotes foreign investment, expands the private sector and dutifully pays off its debts, according to a proposal revealed on Monday by the ruling Communist party.

But it will not renounce the socialist system installed half a century ago after Fidel Castro took power in a 1959 revolution, according to the 32-page document that will guide debates at a Communist party congress in April.

"The economic policy in the new phase will correspond with the principle that only socialism is capable of overcoming difficulties and preserving the gains of the revolution, and that in the updating of the economic model, planning will be paramount, not the market." - it said.

The document, entitled "Guidelines of Economic and Social Policy," is the program of reforms President Raul Castro will place before the party congress for its consideration.

They could be modified during extensive public discussions ahead of the congress, which was announced by the president on Monday night and will be the first since 1997.

The congress is where Cuba's only legal political party sets direction for the country, supposedly for the next five years, although it will have been 14 years since the last meeting.

The April gathering will be particularly important because, given the age of current leadership, it will be the last for the generation that fought the revolution and has held power since then, hewing hard to communist ideology.

President Castro, 79, took office in 2008 after older brother Fidel Castro, 84, ruled the island for 49 years and finally resigned due to ill health.

He promised to improve the daily lives of Cubans and has focussed on economic improvement, including major reforms announced in September to cut a million government jobs and expand the private sector by granting 250,000 new licenses for self-employment.

ONLY THE ECONOMY
He said Cuba's economy will be the only topic at the congress.

The guidelines include reforms already begun by Raul Castro -- among them the reduction of the state's role in the society and the decentralization of agricultural management.

They include a proposal to eliminate the monthly food ration Cubans receive, symbol of decades of state paternalism and a particular target of Raul Castro, who says handouts have discouraged productivity.

They also call for provisions for bank credits for the new self-employed and wholesale stores to cut their costs, but also for them to pay taxes to finance public spending.

In contrast to past policy, state-owned businesses that do not make money will be completely liquidated.

And the authorities will look to improve the country's international credibility "through the strict fulfilment of contract commitments."

Cuba's standing with the international business community has been damaged the past two years as a cash crunch forced the freezing of Cuban bank accounts held by foreign businesses and of payments to many of them.

The party also proposes "to continue encouraging the participation of foreign capital in Cuba, complementing national investment in those activities of interest to the country."


The document mentions, for example, the development of golf courses, marinas and luxury condominiums to attract wealthier visitors to the Caribbean island.

Raul Castro said that before being distributed, a copy of the guidelines was submitted to Fidel Castro for his consideration. Even though he is no longer president, he is still head of the Communist party.

By Esteban Israel

From: SwissInfo

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Cuba fires minister in charge of oil and nickel

Is this the first layoff of the 500.000?

Now ex-minister Yadira Garcia with ex-president Castro

Cuba fired Basic Industry Minister Yadira Garcia, in charge of the oil and nickel industries, on Sunday and said the first vice minister would stand in until a replacement was named.

A government communique said Garcia was let go due to "her deficiencies manifested, especially in poor control of resources destined for investment and the productive process."

First Vice Minister Thomas Benitez was named as a temporary replacement "until a new minister can be appointed," the statement said.

The ministry is also in charge of the cement industry and domestic pharmaceutical industry.

The Cuban oil industry is preparing to drill with foreign partners in the Gulf of Mexico next year and in partnership with Venezuela is developing its refining and other oil related infrastructure.

Unrefined nickel is Cuba's most important export at around 70,000 tonnes per year and a joint venture with Venezuela plans to add 60,000 tonnes of ferronickel by 2013.

Garcia was the last economic minister inherited by President Raul Castro in 2008 when he replaced ailing brother Fidel Castro.

Raul Castro replaced the other ministers in 2009.

From: Reuters Africa

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