Cuba is reaffirming its Marxist ideology in an attempt to regain slipping state control of the economy. Douglas Farah reports from Havana
Facing a freeze in Cuban-United States relations and slipping state control of the economy, Cuba’s ruling Communist Party has slowed moves toward free-market economics, raised pressure on dissidents and re- emphasised its orthodox Marxist rhetoric.
Around the country, old propaganda signs are being refreshed, new billboards denouncing the US economic embargo are going up, and buildings housing the Committees for the Defence of the Revolution are being repaired. Reaffirming the Marxist, socialist nature of the Cuban revolution is again the focal point of speeches.
While changes permitting some private enterprise and foreign investment will not be rolled back, according to senior government officials and diplomats, the pace of future moves toward a market economy – especially those related to increasing self-employment – are likely to slow down or be put on hold.
President Fidel Castro, in a ceremony on April 16 marking the 35th anniversary of his declaration of the revolution as socialist, said that Cuba had resisted pressure to change and that “we’re prepared to resist another 35 years, and 35 times 35 years”.
In part, the call to return to ideological purity reflects increased concern that a growing sector of the economy is moving out from under state control, say diplomats and Cuban analysts. Another factor often cited is increased government optimism that this year’s crucial sugar harvest is on target to reach 4,5-million tons, up from last year’s disastrous 3,3-million tons, the lowest in 40 years.
If the harvest reaches that goal, the government will be able to pay off the $300- million in commercial loans it took out last year, at 18% interest, to rebuild the industry, which is vital to returning the economy to sustained growth. Official figures show the economy shrank by 36% from 1989 to 1992, following the collapse of the Soviet bloc, which heavily subsidised Cuba.
Since 1993, Cuba has legalised use of dollars, authorised limited self-employment, allowed farmers to sell surplus produce on the open market and offered cash incentives to workers in key sectors of the economy to produce more. The result has been not only an upturn in the economy, but also the creation of a class with access to goods and services not available to those who work for the state at fixed wages in Cuban pesos, usually about $16 a month.
“We need time to assimilate and consolidate the steps we have already taken, especially in self-employment,” says Alfredo Gonzalez, senior adviser in the Ministry of Economics and Planning. “The moves have had contradictory effects. When some people start to get rich, it has a social impact. University professors and social workers, who earn only in pesos, are starting to ask, ‘When will it be my turn?'”
Some of the party faithful are not waiting. A professor of Marxism at the University of Havana can be found most nights harmonising with a musical trio that strolls through a plush dollar restaurant, singing romantic ballads for tips. He said he made more in two nights there than at his academic job in a month.
University students, long praised as the vanguard of the revolution, are trying desperately to get into business administration and computer classes. According to academic sources, only seven students signed up last semester to study Marxism, once one of the most popular courses.
The opening salvo in the ideological rollback was fired by Raul Castro, brother of the president and head of the armed forces, in a March 23 speech to a meeting of the party’s 212-member Central Committee. It was only the fifth full meeting of the committee since Fidel Castro took over in 1959, and the first since 1992.
Raul Castro called for renewed ideological vigour, especially in the watch committees. He sharply criticised some parts of the economic changes already implemented, including foreign influences spread through the growing tourism industry, and the relative wealth of some people who are now legally allowed to form their own small businesses.
“Fundamentally, it is understood that ideology is at the root of everything,” Raul Castro said.
The meeting was held a month after Cuban-US relations took their sharpest plunge in three decades, when Cuban air force jets shot down two small airplanes belonging to the Miami- based exile group Brothers to the Rescue. In response, President Bill Clinton signed into law the Helms-Burton Act, which seeks to strengthen the 34-year-old US economic embargo against Cuba.
Using the threat of covert US operations, the Cuban government stepped up attacks on dissident groups, independent journalists and even reformist academic groups that were largely financed by the Communist Party. Academic sources said committees are reviewing the work of academic centres, their finances and their foreign contacts.
The tone was set by Raul Castro, who accused the US of financing “the proliferation and growth of small groups of traitors within the country”.
Ricardo Alarcon, president of the National Assembly, defended the crackdown on Communist Party-financed think tanks, which won international attention by pushing for faster, deeper economic change.
“The party has the right to question and analyse whether a centre that depends on it for material and human resources is doing what it is supposed to do, and if not, to correct things,” he said.
Robert Menendez, representing the US at the United Nations Human Rights Commission meeting in Geneva, accused Havana last week of carrying out “the most repressive wave we have seen in the recent history of Cuba”. On Tuesday, the commission passed a resolution condemning Cuba for not allowing freedom of assembly and expression. – The Washington Post