Cuba on the eve of change

Outside View: Cuba on the eve of change
By PYOTR ROMANOV
UPI Outside View Commentator

MOSCOW, Nov. 14 (UPI) -- Having spent two weeks in Havana, I saw for
myself what seemed quite obvious: after Fidel's departure, which is not
far off, Cuba is in for serious change.

The Cubans themselves are well aware of this. The official slogan about
the monolithic unity of Cuban society is no more than a propaganda myth.
Some Cubans are looking forward to change, and are already thinking of
how to adapt better to the future reality, while others are sticking to
their old positions and getting ready to resist change. Still others are
somewhere in between. They are trying to be flexible, and combine the
gains of the Castro era (which do exist whatever his enemies may say)
with the efforts to develop a full-fledged democracy and an effective
economy that would be oriented to social values.

Only a few people I talked to voiced a different opinion. Giving credit
to Castro's prestige, they argued that the loss of a leader of such
caliber does not mean the end of an era. "We are closely studying
Vietnam's experience, where the party managed to fully preserve its
positions after Ho Chi Minh's death," said one of them.

I'm not sure that such a parallel is justified. It is more in the nature
of a dream. The Cubans and the Vietnamese have little in common in
mentality, and the geopolitic positions of their countries are
different. But I've decided to quote this view since it exists among
some members of the Cuban political elite.

Before making political forecasts, let's determine the point of
departure. In other words, let's sum up what Fidel Castro has given to
Cubans, and where he has let them down.

In 1959, the Barbudos brought victory to one of Cuba's three traditional
movements -- the radical trend, which considered Jose Marti its apostle.
A Cuban thinker and poet, he consistently fought against imperialism and
for Cuba's sovereignty. Two other movements were the moderate centrists
who merely bargained with the United States for a little more
independence for Cuba, and the annexationists, who wanted Cuba to join
the land of "great American democracy." At that time, both of these
movements lost, but their remnants are still there.

It is possible that these trends will gain momentum when Fidel is gone.
According to some sources, about 500 clandestine opposition groups are
operating in Cuba today. So far, they are small and scattered, and do
not exert serious influence on the domestic situation. Their members do
not dispute this fact themselves -- I had a chance to talk with some of
them. But this is how the matters stand today. I wouldn't underestimate
the Cuban domestic opposition tomorrow.

Cuba's sovereignty is one of Castro's major achievements. This is the
main goal, which Marti -- Fidel's ideological teacher -- set before
Cuban society. There is no doubt that Cuba has gained genuine
independence against the backlash of permanent confrontation with the
United States. Moreover, Cuba has managed to protect its sovereignty not
only against American hostility, but also against Soviet friendship.
Cuba simply put on a socialist mask in gratitude for Soviet help but in
reality, Marxist-Leninist ideas have never had any deep influence on
Castro or his associates, and Cuba's policy has always been independent
of Moscow.

Today, it is particularly clear that socialism was just a mask. Granma,
the official newspaper of the Cuban communist party, mentions this word
on rare occasions, to say nothing of Marxist-Leninist classics. In the
two weeks I was there, I did not see a single portrait of Lenin or Marx,
although I didn't set myself a special task of finding one. But there
were many monuments to Marti all around. Even the pre-revolutionary
monument to his mother, put up by Cuba's great Masonic lodge in 1956, is
in excellent shape.

After the Soviet Union's disintegration, Cuba turned to China. However,
Chinese influence on its ideology is no more serious than the Soviet one
was in the past. At any rate, it is limited exclusively to the economy,
and Havana's conspicuous politeness towards Beijing by no means implies
ideological proximity.

In other words, in Cuba, Marti has consistently defeated Marx, Lenin,
Mao, and Deng Xiaoping. I'm sure that in the future he will "update"
Castro as well because the 1959 revolution has failed to reach his other
goal -- bring genuine democracy to the Freedom Island.

In this respect, Havana has every reason for despair. Cuba has
indisputable achievements in education and medicine but it has obviously
failed to build a free and democratic society, and an effective economy,
which would ensure a decent life for its population. Rank-and-file
Cubans have remained poor despite the government's versatile social support.

The Cubans are always blaming their economic hardships on the American
blockade. They have some grounds for that. It is very difficult to
survive in such conditions. Washington is the only capital, which fails
to understand that its blockade is absolutely immoral and irrational.
The recent voting in the United Nations on a resolution urging an end to
the blockade has made this particularly clear. Out of 188 countries only
four voted against it: the United States, Israel, and two more
"influential" states, the Seychelles and Palau.

However, this does not mean that the Cuban economy does not require
sweeping reforms. Whether the state wants it or not, it will have to
allow private enterprise if it wants to improve its economic
performance. There is simply no other option.

The Cuban leaders are aware of this, at least to some extent. This is
why the Cuban economy is a mixture of seemingly incompatible archaic and
modern elements. It is, in fact, already closer to the market than it
was in the Soviet Union before its disintegration. Many corporations and
plants are joint stock companies with foreign participation.

To sum up, at the dusk of Castro's era Cuba has largely given up its
socialist principles in the economy (at least in their Soviet version).
Ideologically, it is drifting back to Jose Marti's principles, and to
the traditional Latin American Bolivarian ideas of fighting for
independence.

It is hard to say which part of this policy is purposeful, and which was
forced by the circumstances, but today's Cuba is moving in the direction
of those countries that are placing their bets not so much on the
socialist economy as on the socially oriented capitalist model. Brazil,
Venezuela (for all the radical rhetoric of the extravagant Hugo Chavez),
Bolivia, and now Nicaragua (after Daniel Ortega's victory) are following
this road.

--

(Pyotr Romanov is a political commentator at RIA Novosti. This article
was reprinted with permission from the news agency.)

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