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CUBA
NEWS
The
Miami Herald
Power shortages force new blackouts
in Cuba
Cuba announced a new
round of scheduled blackouts because of
problems at a thermoelectrical plant.
By Andrea Rodriguez, Associated
Press. Posted on Fri, Oct. 01, 2004.
HAVANA - Faced with severe problems in
the island's electrical system, the government
says it will schedule energy-saving blackouts
and shut 118 power-consuming factories for
the month of October.
The measures were announced Wednesday night
on a television program in which President
Fidel Castro acknowledged Cubans' growing
irritation with the island's faltering electrical
system.
Castro has appeared three successive nights
on a regular round-table discussion on state
television, dealing this week with the problems
in Cuba's electrical grid that have grown
in recent months.
But no measures were announced until Wednesday
when Vice President Carlos Lage said on
the show that a schedule for energy-saving
blackouts would soon be published to inform
Cubans when their provinces and neighborhoods
would be affected.
Castro recognized ''the problems created
for the population'' by recent blackouts
linked to a severe mechanical problem in
a turbine in Cuba's most important thermoelectrical
plant, the Antonio Guiteras plant in the
Matanzas province west of Havana.
Although there are several other thermoelectrical
plants across the island of 11 million,
they are linked nationwide and a major failure
in one can affect regular power supplies
for the entire country.
Castro also blamed himself for not earlier
realizing the severity of the problem.
''An electrical system that has all these
problems is a weak system,'' he said.
The blackouts have created havoc in Cubans'
daily lives, affecting the flow of water
for drinking and bathing in households,
causing frozen food to thaw, refrigerated
food to spoil, and silencing fans and air
conditioners.
Lage said other measures aimed at saving
energy would include cutting the average
government workday from eight to 7 ½
hours and starting school classes a half-hour
later.
The dilemma: Confiscated properties
By Marifeli Perez-Stable,
marifeli18@hotmail.com. Posted on Thu, Sep.
30, 2004.
It won't be easy going forward. Transitions
impose steep costs, and Cuba's will likely
be steeper still: The future has been too
long postponed. Yet, the present will not
last forever, and all of us who care about
the island need to think outside the proverbial
box so that hope is then sown where despair
has flourished. The issue of confiscated
properties is certain to be among the thorniest.
Though useful, the experiences of Central
and Eastern Europe have not yielded a model
law that Cuba could follow. Hungary chose
to compensate, while the rest of the region
opted for restitution. Each policy has financial,
legal and political pros and cons. Evictions,
which occurred often enough everywhere,
are the most politically charged cost of
restitution. Compensation can be a financial
drain on a nascent market economy.
Either policy is complex and time-consuming.
Proof of ownership is sometimes impossible
to establish. Defining eligible claimants
can be problematic. If the original owners
have died, how distant can a relation be
to qualify as an heir? The Czech Republic
and Bulgaria required claimants to be citizens
in residence. Throughout the region, bureaucratic
mazes often frustrated the pursuit of claims.
Largely due to West Germany's financial
resources and administrative expertise,
unified Germany's policy of restitution
was the most comprehensive and successful.
To invest, acquire assets
One thing is patently clear: Guaranteeing
private property is intrinsic to a market
transition. Redressing wrongful confiscations
is requisite for the rule of law. New democracies
should create a secure environment for nationals
and foreigners to invest and acquire assets.
The Central and Eastern European countries
that rapidly privatized and best guaranteed
property rights are now more prosperous
and democratic.
In a way, it's that simple. At the same
time, the reason why there is no model law
is that each country has its own history
and culture. It would be folly not to frame
the issue of confiscated properties politically
as well as legally and financially.
Two central observations come to mind regarding
Cuban political culture.
o Nationalism: Even after the communist
turn, millions still felt the revolution
as Cuban as the royal palm trees.
o The U.S.-Cuba relationship: The pending
transition should be the moment to finally
set it right.
These are axial coordinates on Cuba's jagged
political terrain.
In the early 1960s, the revolutionary government
confiscated U.S. and major Cuban enterprises
to the thunderous applause of most citizens.
In their hearts, millions believed that
the revolution would finally deliver on
the promise that the republic (founded in
1902) had not fully met. What had been unthinkable
a few years earlier -- the elimination of
private property -- was hailed.
Today, the opposite is the case. Whatever
good intentions the revolution once had
have long dissipated. The current government
offers nothing but more of the same: a dead
end. Ordinary Cubans fully understand that
only the comandante's capriciousness has
prevented an economic restructuring such
as China's and Vietnam's. A thoughtful message
in favor of private property, thus, would
likely find receptive ears in Cuba.
It should, however, cast a wide net beyond
the early confiscations. In 1968, for example,
the government closed down 58,000 small
businesses. Even after enacting modest economic
reforms in the early 1990s, the regime has
routinely violated the right to self-employment,
seizing citizens' assets or closing their
paladares (home-based restaurants). The
claims of all owners should be duly recognized.
Under current U.S. law, Cuban claimants
who are now U.S. citizens are included with
other U.S. claims. Though we can legally
be represented by the United States, I suggest
that we decline and, instead, deal directly
with a duly elected government in Havana
to reach an agreement on our confiscated
properties. If we did, we would be loosening
the U.S.-Cuban Gordian knot and prodding
the relationship onto the right track. What
was at the start a Cuban conflict would
thus be settled among Cubans.
In a market transition, there is no escaping
the matter of U.S. and Cuban confiscated
properties. How amends are made will mark
Cuba, the diaspora and the U.S.-Cuban relationship
for better or for worse.
I'm rooting for a new national discourse
of Cuban entrepreneurship that bridges the
Florida Straits while Washington looks on
from afar.
Marifeli Pérez-Stable is vice president
for democratic governance at the Inter-American
Dialogue in Washington, D.C.
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