La Asamblea Nacional, el parlamento cubano, se reúne este viernes en La Habana para enfrentar la difícil tarea de aprobar varias medidas gubernamentales que seguramente no serán del agrado de la población
It is the island of which Ernest Hemingway once wrote: “It not only looks wonderful, it is wonderful.” It is famed around the world for its unspoilt beaches, the rhythm of its music, its staunchly communist regime and its political stand-off with the United States.
Yet today, with the ink barely dry on Fidel Castro’s resignation as President after half a century in power, Cuba’s Ministry of Tourism will announce plans to build that most capitalist of institutions – a luxury golf resort complete with multimillion-dollar villas.
NEW YORK (Billboard) – Cuban pianist Chuchito Valdes would very much like for his famed jazz musician father to be allowed to perform again stateside.
So would more than 200 musicians, activists and government policymakers — among them Robert Browning of the World Music Institute and Rep. John Conyers Jr., D-Mich. — who gathered in late April in Washington, D.C., for a two-day summit on changing U.S. policies on Cuba. The group convened at HR-57, a nonprofit arts organization named for a 1987 House resolution authored by Conyers that designated jazz “a rare and valuable American national treasure” worthy of federal support.
Since 2003, the Bush administration has prevented Cuban musicians from entering the United States through visa denials and has curtailed the ability of American musicians to travel there, via license restrictions. One of the most notable examples was the denial of a visa for veteran singer Ibrahim Ferrer to attend the Grammy Awards in 2004.
It also reversed the Clinton administration’s policy of “people-to-people exchange,” which in the late ’90s started something of a renaissance for Cuban musicians and their work in the States. Among those who participated in the celebrated cross-cultural performances was Chuco Valdes, Chuchito’s father. Now, while the younger Valdes, who lives in Mexico, can perform stateside, his father, who lives in Cuba, is forbidden from doing so.
For many Cuban musicians, U.S. exposure is considered vital — and some are willing to take tremendous risks for the chance to succeed. The issue took a tragic turn in April when Cuban reggaeton singer Elvis Manuel died while trying to cross from Cuba to Miami in a small boat.
The current campaign for a change in the Bush administration’s policy was stimulated in fall 2007 by an impassioned open letter to American intellectuals and artists from Ballet Nacional de Cuba director Alicia Alonso.
“Let us work together so that Cuban artists can take their talent to the United States,” Alonso wrote. Taking that spirit as his call to arms, Louis Head, executive director of U.S. Cuba Cultural Exchange, a national network of artists and presenters, devised an online letter petitioning the Bush administration to reverse its policy.
“The response to that letter was overwhelming,” Head says. Among the hundreds who signed on were singer/songwriter Jackson Browne and guitarist/producer Ry Cooder, who collaborated with Cuban musicians for 1997’s “Buena Vista Social Club,” on which Ferrer, who died in 2005, played a key role.
Head hopes that since Fidel Castro has stepped down and a new U.S. administration will soon take office, the climate may be right for change. “What’s important,” he says, “is that we’ve organized arts presenters, agents, record company executives and educators to let Congress know how we feel.”
“As far as I’m concerned, Cuba is a wellspring of talent and influence,” says Blue Note Records president Bruce Lundvall, who signed Chucho Valdes to his label through a foreign imprint. “And I’d like that connection back.”
Philadelphia – “I take pride in my Spanish accent,” Cuban-born poet Julio Cardenas rhymed in Spanish. “Pure Cuban. Pure African. With a Latin flavor, today I represent those that still haven’t found their path.” Read the rest of this entry ?
The secretary general of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS), Luis Fernando Andrade, is scheduled to arrive in Cuba on Tuesday evening, as the guest of the Cuban Foreign Ministry.
HAVANA (AFP) – Despite a dizzying array of reforms since Raul Castro took the helm of Cuba’s government, 2008 looks to be a record year for emigration, as inhabitants abandon the communist island in droves.
In the first half of the US fiscal year, which began on October 1, almost 3,000 Cubans tried to reach US shores by crossing the shark-infested Florida Straits, according to the US Interests Section in Havana. The number represents a 21 percent increase over the previous year.
Some Cubans are abandoning the island of some 11 million inhabitants legally; Others leave illegally, crowded on smugglers’ fastboats. Almost all are heading to the islands nearby arch-enemy, the United States.
Illegal emigrants — who are returned to Cuba by US authorities if picked up at sea, but get to stay in the United States if they reach US soil — are joined another 20,000 Cubans to whom the Interests Section grants legal immigrant visas here every year, under the immigration accords Havana and Washington struck in 1994 and 1995.
And to their total one can add some 10,000 who hand themselves to US authorities at the Mexican border.
US authorities estimate that some 35,000 Cubans will arrive to stay this year in the United States, which grants them immediate residency and working rights for fleeing communism. It does not do the same for Chinese or Vietnamese immigrants.
Cuba charges that the US policy granting Cubans special benefits encourages dangerous and potentially deadly illegal migration.
The number of Cubans who additionally are departing for Europe and Latin American countries is not known.
Far from tapering off, what often is described as a “silent exodus” has actually picked up since Raul Castro took the reins of government — officially as president in February, and for over a year as interim leader before then — although his government has introduced a steady stream of minor reforms aimed at eliminating unpopular restrictions and boosting economic efficiency.
With calm weather at sea, illegal departures by sea were up sharply in February and March, from 219 to 412, US data show. Most of those picked up at sea are between 19 and 35, US Interests Section figures show.
Indeed, fully 70 percent of Cubans who made the crossing to the United States did so with smugglers, paying 8,000-10,000 dollars per person, the section’s data showed.
Witnesses say the smugglers’ craft sometimes even set out in broad daylight from isolated locations including on the Island of Youth, witnesses say.
In addition, the United States now is stepping up a family reunification program for Cubans who want to go live with US-based relatives. Paperwork that had been taking up to seven to 10 years now can take as little as a few weeks. There are some 1.5 million Cuban-Americans, including immigrants and their US-born descendants.
Many of them send remittance funds back to Cuba to help their families make ends meet; Cubans earn an average of the equivalent of less than 20 dollars a month and those living abroad send home about one billion dollars a year.
Earlier this month, access to appliances such as microwaves and computers was just the latest of some traditional “bans” to be dumped by Raul Castro, 76, five weeks after taking over permanently from his 81-year-old brother Fidel, who did not seek reelection.
The Raul Castro government also has dropped its controversial ban on Cubans staying in hotels reserved for the tourists who generate the lion’s share of the Caribbean island’s hard currency. Some rights groups had dubbed the policy “tourist apartheid.”
The change is expected to be welcomed by Cubans living abroad who come home for visits and want to treat relatives to hotel stays, although locals are unlikely to be stampeding for rooms that can cost up to 300 dollars a night.
The government also has moved to try to boost farm output with some small reform steps, and said it would allow Cubans who are renting homes from state employers to gain title to them that can be passed on to their heirs.
On April 14, all Cubans for the first time will be allowed to sign contracts for cell (mobile) phones, and will be able to reach friends and relatives in the United States and beyond.
Cuba watchers say there is likely a short-term political benefit of allowing greater economic openness, though they also warn many changes in the Americas’ only centrally-controlled, one-party regime could build pressure for more change than the government is prepared to allow.
El gobierno de Cuba anunció la agilización de trámites para que muchos trabajadores estatales puedan adquirir viviendas que pertenecen a entidades del gobierno.
La intención de la medida -publicada este viernes en Gaceta Oficial- busca hacer más sencillos los trámites para traspasar viviendas a aquellos cubanos que las han rentado por 20 años.
En la resolución se establece que llegado a ese término “le asiste a los arrendatarios el derecho a la transferencia de la propiedad de la misma”.
Desburocratizando
La ley data de 1988, pero los trámites tan burocráticos han hecho muy difícil hacer el debido traspaso.
Esta medida del Instituto Nacional de la Vivienda intenta entonces que los cubanos que trabajan para ciertas entidades del Estado sean sus propietarios y además permitir que al morir éstos, sus descendientes puedan heredar tales viviendas.
“En el caso de que el arrendatario hubiera fallecido, también están legitimados sus herederos para la promoción del trámite”, indica la resolución fechada el 14 de marzo.
En el caso de los cubanos que trabajan para una brigada denominada “Blas Roca Calderío”, el tiempo de alquiler necesario para poder adquirir la propiedad de la vivienda se reduce a sólo cinco años.
El hecho novedoso de esta resolución es que el proceso desde ahora se descentraliza y los cubanos sólo tendrán que hacer los trámites directamente con la entidad donde trabajan.
Esta promoción es realizada ante la Dirección Municipal de la Vivienda del municipio donde se encuentra situada la vivienda”.
Uno de los graves problemas que tiene Cuba es su inmenso déficit de viviendas.
Se cree que es necesaria la construcción de por lo menos medio millón de casas para solventar el problema.
Además cientos de miles de hogares que ya existen están en muy mal estado.
Por otro lado, el gobierno cubano no ha podido cumplir con las metas anuales de construcción por una diversidad de factores que incluye falta de materiales, carencia de mano de obra y corrupción.
Atlantis 