May 21, 1997

GRANMA IN CUBANET?

HAVANA, May 19, 1997 (BPIC).- In early May, CubaNet informed our independent press agency, that news from the daily Granma, official newspaper of the Cuban Communist Party, would be appearing in the pages of the electronic news service, and that they requested the opinion of some of the Cuban journalists, who struggle here for freedom of expression.

In spite of the fact that totalitarianism has engraved, in our minds, through three decades, a certain framework of thought, which makes it difficult to evade, I believe it necessary to analize this issue in depth.

Our democratic and free thinking conscience, forces us to accept CubaNet's project in part, but I must warn against the pitfalls that may follow, if minimal precautions are not taken.

In the best of cases, we will be labeled mad reds, of (being) agents from Cuban State Security, or accused us of kneeling shamelessly and lowering our weapons to the Caribbean sovereign.

Some have the view that, this inclusion of Granma in CubaNet's program, would place the independent press in Cuba, into the classical middle of the road, because, between the communist spokesman and us, would be, in addition, the voices from the foreign press agencies accredited in the country, the ones who look upon us as if we were maggots in a festering wound.

If the issue is to establish a comparative forum of the information so that the readers can reach their own conclusions, for the reader to determine who is manipulating the information, and what has been hidden to them about the national reality, I very much agree with that. Our approval is unequivocal.

But if they seek to highlight, and bring to the forefront, those who have earned a suma cum laude in thrashing the truth on behalf of communist propaganda, then I don't approve of it. The last bulwark of a dead philosophy, regardless of their brandished professionalism, should not be elevated in a medium which, up to now, has been the pulpit of those marginalized and persecuted in a Cuba which suffers behind the smiling and false mask which Castro's totalitarianism portrays abroad.

From my point of view, which I hope will be as respected as that of the others, I ask that you stay alert at the time of reaching a final decision. A mistake, brothers, would drown you in infamy.

Translated for CubaNet by Lourdes Arriete