This week a new political cycle has started in Cuba marked by the arrival of the presidential change and the retirement of Raúl Castro as Head of State. In the United States some opine that it will be a mere transfer of power without real change implications for Cuba; others speculate that the new leadership from another generation and whose surname is not Castro will carry out an agenda marked by greater pragmatism. What scenario awaits the person who will hold a post with such a strange title as that of “new President of the Council of State of Cuba”? How will the permanence of Raúl Castro as First Secretary of the Communist Party be decisive during his mandate? What new and old, internal and external actors will be his interlocutors? Raúl Castro embraces Miguel Díaz-Canel at the time of his nomination as a candidate to president of the Councils of State and of Ministers of Cuba, April 18. Photo: Courtesy of Cubadebate / EFE. It is clear that the role of the new leader is set within a project of continuity backed by a majority that is clearly cautious and, even more, incredulous in the face of ghost stories....

It is difficult to foresee the sign of upcoming times for Cuba. The majority of the stories circulating about the recent “change of power” on the island do not see a factor of radical change in the brand-new government, with a new legislature of the National Assembly and a new Head of State. Now the face of power is that of an engineer born in 1960, who was not in the Sierra Maestra but who accumulates a sustained experience at all levels of political activity in Cuba. That, per se, is a great novelty. But perhaps it is not sufficient. Miguel Díaz-Canel inherits as Head of State a Cuba with dual currencies, blockaded by the United States which has cooled its relations with the island, a country with a depressed economy. A country that, in addition, is rapidly aging and continues marked by a strong tendency toward emigration. Will the process of reforms be speeded up? When and how will the Constitution be modified? What is the style of the wished-for leadership? Will the forms of making politics in Cuba change? In a context of so many questions, OnCuba has asked a group of Cubans for their opinion, based on...

Company Cuban Soho, the first of its style created in Cuba, celebrates its 15 years. These days also is happening the II Encounter of Dance and Music of the Middle West, an unusual event for many here. We want you to know what’s going to happened and participate in one of their presentations, workshops or discussion panels. You’ll end up liking it. That’s only the start, but we have more. If you’re in Havana you could also enjoy the show Cuba vibra! by Lizt Alfonso Dance Cuba. And in Music, if you’re in USA, you sure want to be amazed by Chucho Valdes or dance with Havana D’Primera. In Visual Arts, one expo in Pabellon Cuba. In Literature, we’ll celebrate the language day; and in FAC, surprises as always. See you around!   II Encounter of Dance and Music of the Middle West Havana Habibi  Yesterday began this event with many activities ‘til next Sunday 22nd. If you want to know more about the music and dance of that region, don’t forget to check their proposals. You can see the full program here. Among the activities there will be the panel Dialogue for Dance and Peace “Transnational Feminism and Transformation...

In his first public address as Cuba’s Head of State, Miguel Díaz-Canel gave a speech confirming that his presidency will be marked by continuity. He fundamentally spoke of the Cuban Revolution and the legacy of its leaders, and used phrases by Silvio Rodríguez and Fidel Castro. He spoke little about the future of the island, and briefly about its present. These are 15 quotes as a mode of summary: “I’m not here to promise anything.” “The mandate given by the people to this legislature is the continuity of the Revolution.” “We consider we must maintain the unity that has characterized us all these years.” “Raúl will head the most important decisions for the present and the future.” “For us it is totally clear that only the PCC guarantees the Cuban nation’s unity and is the honorable heir of the people’s trust in its leaders.” “There is no space for a transition that destroys what has been achieved during so many years.” “It falls on us to be more creative in the discussion of our truths.” “…lies reign today on the world internet.” “…the prosperity we owe to ourselves and which we will have to conquer sooner than later.” “I know...

For a Cuban citizen, in theory and according to the laws in force, to become the country’s president – or of the Council of State, the official post according to the Constitution of the Republic – call it as you may and having the formation he may have, he/she must meet four necessary stages. Just four stages. Without them they will not be able to aspire to the presidency. OnCuba proposes a look at these stages, their requirements and forms of election. It is the climax of the elections on the island. 1- To be nominated as a candidate to deputy to the National Assembly It is a basic step but indispensable. In Cuba there are no direct presidential elections but rather second degree, in which the deputies to the National Assembly elect one of its members as president of the Council of State. Therefore, to hold that presidential post it is necessary to first be elected as a deputy. Since the Communist Party – the only legal one on the island – doesn’t officially nominate the National Assembly and neither does this decision fall on the voters – as it does occur on a local level -, the preselection...

He was a young, long-haired slim official who used to ride his bike greeting neighbors and because of his personal style of leading his province he was as popular as a local rock star. A decade went by since then and Miguel Díaz-Canel – who will now possibly succeed President Raúl Castro in Cuba’s presidency – looks like someone else, another person: grey haired, serious, thrifty with words and with scarce public visibility. Díaz-Canel, who is currently the first vice president, has a short official biography of personal and professional details, and although no one knows for certain how he will project himself in his government, there are some signs of what will possibly be a new style. In a country where there doesn’t exist the figure of first lady and the leaders – who usually move in the midst of important security operatives - zealously hide their private life, Díaz-Canel arrived almost without guards last March at a voting center in Santa Clara, some 300 kilometers east of the capital, where several foreign media were waiting. Miguel Díaz-Canel with his wife, Liz Cuesta. Photo: AJ Díaz / CMHW. The official walked along one block, holding his wife’s hand, while...

The forecasts were right. Cuban First Vice President Miguel Díaz-Canel was officially nominated to the presidency of the Council of State and of Ministers of Cuba, which confirms him as Raúl Castro’s successor. The Assembly already approved the nomination and is voting in secret now, although a different result is not expected. As first vice president, Salvador Valdés Mesa, almost 73 years old, was nominated as Díaz-Canel’s substitute. Until now he was one of the vice presidents of the Council of State and his nomination has been a surprise since his name did not appear among the favorites of the analysts to hold this post. If ratified, it will be the first time that Cuba has a black first vice president, and Valdés Mesa will be the man of that race that will have reached a post of the highest political rank in the country. General view this Wednesday April 18 of the constitutive session of the 9th Legislature of the National Assembly of People’s Power. Photo: Alejandro Ernesto / EFE. Valdés Mesa, 72, is a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC). Previously he was the General Secretary of the Central Organization of Cuban...

  In a few hours Cuba will wake up with a post Castro government. It wasn’t because of Washington, which except for a direct invasion by its legions, tried it all; nor was it Moscow’s tragedy; nor the domestic mistakes; nor all this together; it was rather because of an agent of changes that doesn’t go on holidays: time. On the avenues, the propaganda banners are in grey, a parabola that the country is holding its breath waiting for the slogan that will guide the generational changing of power created by the founding fathers of the Revolution. The expectations among the Cubans are not so much about the possible figures of the cabinet, almost all of them hierarchically foreseeable, but rather about how the new administration will handle the process of ongoing reforms, explicitly about an “updating.” Seeking retrospective and present approximations to the current scenario, the most speculated, observed and decisive of the socialist project, OnCuba knocked on the door of Juan Valdés Paz (1938), 2014 National Prize for Social and Humanistic Sciences. Skillful in heterodoxies, a follower of Guevara when not accepting to be an obedient official and, above all, loyal to a coherence that has allowed him...

Lisandra Ordaz, from Pinar del Río, is the first Cuban woman with the title of International Master (IM) in chess with no distinction of sex. The Presidential Board of the International Chess Federation, gathered in Minsk, Belorussia, confirmed the title. Last October, the 29-year-old chess player completed the only condition she was missing to receive the title when she surpassed the barrier of the ELO of 2,400 points. She won the record thanks to her second place in the Don Modesto Castellón Tournament in Yucatan, Mexico. Her performance in Mexico raised her ranking to 2,414, which added to the three norms of International Master achieved in previous tournaments which allowed her to vie for the title with no distinction of sex. Ordaz had obtained the first of her three norms in the 2010 Capablanca Memorial, the second in Panama’s 2011 Open and the third in the 2013 Carlos Torres Repetto in Memoriam in Mexico. But she needed to exceed the ELO of 2,400 points. “It’s one of the biggest gifts for a life devoted to this beautiful sport. I am extremely happy and grateful to all the persons who made this dream come true, especially my family,” the chess player...

The Cuban ETECSA telecommunications company reported that there are five million active cell phone lines on the island, a figure that confirms “the growing evolution of mobile telephony” in the country, where a decade ago it was forbidden for Cubans to have a cell phone in their name. A resident of Guanabacoa, in Havana, became client number five million to sign a contract with the company, pointed out a note by ETECSA, which reached the four million users in December 2016 and closed 2017 with 4.22 million. “2018 will be another year to continue the process of computerizing Cuban society and with this contribute with more services to the population, to the economy and to development,” indicated the state-run company, the only one that offers telephony and internet services in Cuba. In December 2003 there were 43,000 active cell phone lines, a figure that increased to 223,000 by April 2008. The limitation had been lifted that forbid Cuban citizens to have their own cell phone number – until then only foreigners were allowed to have them –, a measure taken by President Raúl Castro as part of his first reforms in his post. After that, ETECSA arrived at the first...

  Mike Pompeo, CIA director and nominated to be the next secretary of state, affirmed this Thursday that he will work to “build a diplomatic team” in Cuba that can respond to U.S. interests. Speaking of his position about the island in the hearing for his confirmation in the Senate’s Foreign Affairs Committee, Pompeo said that everyone is aware that there are some concerns there, in reference to the alleged acoustic attacks suffered by U.S. diplomats in Havana. Since January, Washington transferred part of the consular services to its embassy in Bogotá, and later to Guyana, due to the 60 percent reduction of its diplomatic mission in response to what it considers an attack against its officials. Senators Jeff Flake (R) and Tom Udall (D) asked the nominee to head U.S. diplomacy if he was thinking of strengthening and recovering that presence in Havana, considering that President Raúl Castro will leave his post soon. After the senators described the U.S. diplomatic corps in Cuba as a “skeletal presence,” Pompeo answered that they are not going to commit themselves to building a team that provides diplomacy there. Udall questioned the CIA director about the possibility of working with the Cuban authorities...

Benicio del Toro and Leonardo DiCaprio will participate in a film about a Cuban-American mafioso capo. Del Toro, as protagonist; DiCaprio as coproducer. But there’s a twisted and at the same time seducing story behind the cinematographic novelty that has its roots on the island and has joined in that same project filmmakers, retired police officers, a best-seller writer and Hollywood celebrities. The film will have as its principal character José Miguel Battle, a Batista policeman and member of Brigade 2506 which landed in the Bay of Pigs, who later became a mafioso leader in the United States. Battle wasn’t just any mafioso capo but rather the head of The Corporation, a group of Cuban-American criminals involved in illegal gambling and the drug trade that moved millions of dollars and left behind a trail of blood and death. Before getting to cinema, the story of the mafioso was turned into a book. Published last week and written in English by organized crime historian T.J. English, The Corporation has been classified by El Nuevo Herald as an extraordinary chronicle of real adventures in the Cuban-American underworld of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. Its author, who a decade before wrote Havana Nocturne...

The 23rd International Dance Festival in Urban Spaces Old Havana: City in Movement just started in the capital historical center. The date will take place until Sunday for you to dance everywhere. We invite you to join this movement, go to the streets a little bit and be surprised with this great carnival. You’ll end up dancing. From Dance we go to Music with a lot of concerts in Havana and Miami, and all kind of genres so you dance even more. In Visual Arts, a main course with Ares expo, also Spanish arts and surprises for tattoo lovers. In Theater, a luxury for those in USA, with a Carlos Diaz and El Publico season. And in FAC, as usual, a lot. See you around!   23rd Festival Old Havana: City in Movement We already announced this last week, and there’s still time for you to get to Old Havana and dance a little bit. Dance will be everywhere, join the party and enjoy. Next Sunday night will be the closure, so from today the good choice is Old Havana. That’s why here you have the program:   But plan well ‘cause there will be also concerts and a new...

  In 2017, the Norwegian Cruise Line Holding (NCLH) ships transported almost 2.5 million travelers and docked at half a thousand ports across the planet. But among all the destinations visited by the U.S. company’s three brands, one of them stood out for the clients’ satisfaction: Havana. When celebrating its first anniversary of operations in Cuba, NCLH officially distinguished the Cuban capital with the award that towers over world famous destinations like Barcelona, Venice, Monte Carlo, Honolulu and Miami. “No other destination has become so popular as rapidly as Havana,” said Frank del Río, president and CEO of the company, during the celebration held last Thursday at the Meliá Cohiba Hotel. Frank del Río, president and CEO of NCLH. Photo: Claudio Pelaez Sordo. On March 9 last year, Oceania Cruises’ Marina ship inaugurated NCLH’s trips to Cuba. A while later cruise ships of its other two brands, Norwegian Cruise Line and Regent Seven Seas Cruises, would dock in Havana. At the close of December, the NCLH ships had brought to the island around 70,000 travelers, a figure which the company hopes to almost double in 2018. For Del Río, the reasons for this popularity are no mystery. “It’s easy to...

For two decades Sarah Saunders has maintained a special link with Cuba, based on her taste for one of the island’s iconic products: cigars. In 2012 this British chef founded the Women’s International Cigar Club (WiCC) to give a different perspective in a traditionally male circuit. “For me, smoking cigars is above all a pleasure,” she says to OnCuba, “and I’m interested in women having the opportunity of enjoying that pleasure and also going beyond, discovering the cigar industry. That’s why I founded the club.” Until now her idea is running smoothly. The club already has around 500 members and hopes to continue growing. For almost six years it has been present in the United Kingdom, Cuba, Italy, Croatia, and has others on its agenda for the next months. Weeks ago, Sarah celebrated the fifth anniversary of the club during the 20th Habano Festival. As is to be imagined, women were the majority during the celebration. Celebrating in Havana the fifth anniversary of the Women´s International Cigar Club. Photo: Otmaro Rodríguez. “Most of the official participants in the Habano Festivals are men, but I know many women linked to making and consuming cigars. There are women involved in this world...

  “When I think of Donald Trump, a flame, an orange circle, with a hole in the center…as if it were a mouth, immediately comes to my mind. Some images are very powerful,” said the Cuban designer Edel Rodríguez. Edel Rodríguez (a Cuban American who resides in New York) has made of the U.S. president many illustrations. He started drawing when Trump was running in his presidential campaign, in 2016. They have always been disquieting images. The first to create a big stir was the cover of the German magazine Der Spiegel (April 2017). Edel drew Donald Trump with a bloodied knife in his left hand and the head of the Statue of Liberty, bleeding, in his right hand. Before this he had even won prizes for a cover of Time magazine, in which Trump was a melted puddle. You have said that your condition of a Latino, of a Cuban American, somehow marks your work, why? All my memories, my experiences, were created in Cuba and in Miami. The music, the food, the family, that is my life. And when I paint, that’s what I have in mind. …………… It was 1993. A young Edel Rodríguez left the city...

Less than a month is left for Cuba to have a new president. In terms of international policy, the entire world has been sensitive to this moment of change and has procured to accompany the process. This is not the case with the United States, whose current president retook the type of discourse and policies that prevailed until 2016, before Barack Obama, in coordination with the Cuban government, thawed the Cold War ice and sat at the negotiation table with Cuba. In an extensive article, the U.S. magazine Foreign Affairs explores the conditions of the island’s “new era” and how the U.S. hostility damages that country’s interests not only in Cuba but also on a regional and world level. The differences “Meet the new boss,” says the text signed by Marguerite Jiménez, senior associate of the Washington Office for Latin American Affairs (WOLA) for Cuba, referring to Cuban First Vice President Miguel Díaz-Canel, who will most probably replace Raúl Castro in the post of Head of State. Díaz-Canel will assume the post one day before turning 58, noted the article, pointing out the age as one of the principal differences in relation to his predecessors. Fidel Castro was 81 when...

The discussion most difficult to win is not the one in which one of the interlocutors has a colossal intelligence or speaks louder than the other. It is the one in which prejudices replace strong elements and reasoning. If arguing with an individual full of prejudices could seem an impossible mission, it is disastrous for the development of a country when those whims permeate society and become a system. In the discussions about the non-state sector in Cuba I have seen how the critical or differing focuses about it are based on bad examples (always anonymous) or using condemnatory phrases that tend to put the bad and the good in the same bag. After seven years of implementing the Guidelines, many prejudices against the private sector still exist in Cuban society. These have been several years of a different vision of the economy. It is also understandable that many look down on us when they go to the shop selling in hard currency that’s on the corner and don’t find what they were looking for because the neighborhood’s paladar polished off everything; or when the driver of the almendrón, without blinking, charges you 20 pesos. But it is necessary to...

This week starts off with the heartbeat of the young audiovisual, to gauge it. The 17th ICAIC Young Film Festival is about to start with a diverse and attractive program. Films, lectures, debates, exhibitions and pitching are what the Festival is proposing. All the information is here. Take a look and head out to the movie theater. There’s also more Cinema with the premiere in Cuba of the documentary Olé, Olé, Olé!: A Trip Across Latin America, about the Rolling Stones’ successful tour of Latin America. And, as always, there are also things in other manifestations. In Visual Arts, four artists get together in an expo in Miami, another two in Berlin and a few more around here. In Music, many concerts, performances you can’t miss like that of Buena Fe in the Karl Marx and that of Kelvis Ochoa in Miami. Lastly, the Proposals of the Fábrica de Arte Cubano, which like every week has it all. For the time being this is what there is. Spend next Friday looking for recommendations. You’re going to love it. See you around!   17th ICAIC Young Film Festival The 17th edition of the ICAIC Young Film Festival will take place from...

When at the start of the process of transformation of the Cuban economy President Raúl Castro presented the need to have a more rational state apparatus he mentioned that some 500,000 workers would have to be taken out of their job posts to other sectors. The non-state sector appeared as one of the possible means to resolve that new problem. In the interval there was a debate about the necessary/wished-for size of the non-state sector in terms of employment and contribution to the GDP. Today we don’t have the figures for its contribution to the GDP, it is true. It is part of the information we are still missing and which at some time we must, and let’s hope it is sooner than later, systematize. But we do have the number of persons who are working in that sector. According to the 2016 Statistical Yearbook of Cuba they represent close to 40 percent of all the country’s working persons. In terms of employment it isn’t marginal at all. Those who don’t have an official permit are not considered in that figure. As in other Latin American countries, that sector, the one of small and medium enterprise about which there has...

The March for Our Lives has just ended in Washington DC. It was not the only one in the entire Union. Perhaps this is the end of a before and the start of an afterwards. Few times in history, perhaps since Vietnam, the expressions “my generation” and “change” have sent such a clear message and different to all those who wanted to hear them, especially the politicians and the members of Congress who for practically a decade have set aside the subject of weapons. From these young people’s perspective, those firearms are only good to kill. The freedom of others to carry them – especially those for military use – end there where they, the children and youngsters, have historically put the dead. Columbine, Sandy Hook and Parkland are barely three chapters of a horror story that usually ends with prayers and condolences until, once again, bullets fall on them like Sisyphus’ heavy rocks. And they refuse to swell the statistics in a culture where there are more weapons than persons and in which violence is like bitter bread eaten day in and day out. Camila Cabello also participated in the march. The speakers – Anglos, Afro-Americans, Latinos/Hispanics… - expressed...

  They had just had lunch and were on their way to a travel agency to pick up their tickets for their annual trip to Cuba. Osvaldo González and Alberto Arias, friends and partners, on Thursday last week ended up beneath a Miami crosswalk, just like so many other persons who were carrying out in a carefree way their daily tasks. An adolescent girl was on her way to the doctor’s to pick up a medicine. A man, the father of three children, was heading home from work. A woman who was going for a manicure stopped at a red light. In seconds, or centimeters, those who would live or die would be decided. Sweetwater detective Juan Llera was in his office a few blocks away when he heard what seemed like a bomb going off. It wasn’t a bomb: it was a crosswalk, a structure so alike others, underneath which millions of persons drove every day. That structure under construction, weighing 950 tons, collapsed at the Florida International University, without giving time to the persons who were there to be able to escape. The vehicles that were beneath at that precise moment were crushed. Six persons died. “Just imagine,”...

Hiroshi Ishiguro is in Cuba but almost no one knows it. A journalist from the Cuban television news system published on his Facebook profile that the Japanese engineer would be in the José Antonio Echeverría Higher Polytechnic last Monday giving a lecture on robots and humans. But let’s not think about industrial robots prepared to fit pieces with great precision, or about small cars driven by hand from a distance, or about the iconic droid that Georges Lucas immortalized in his film Star Wars as R2-D2. Neither should we imagine those anthropomorphic machines that help in cleaning the house, plan the menu and sing bedtime songs with their electronic voices. Engineer Hiroshi Ishiguro is well-known in the world because he has been able to create robotic copies of human beings: perfectly humanoid robots that make us ask ourselves about the perspectives of the relationship between the natural and the artificial world. One of his most famous robots is the GEMINOID HI-4, the scientist’s almost identical replica, whose first version was from 2005 – it’s already on its fourth -, and which is now visiting us in Cuba together with its creator. The robot functions through teleoperation: it captures the signals...

The first beats of the Havana World Music Fest (HWM) already sounded. In its 5th edition it has the best program and the most sophisticated production since its foundation, in 2014. It’s expected an attendance of 15 thousand people, which would be a record for this event. For three days the Metropolitan Park will be a huge stage for the fusion of diverse worldwide music styles. Until tomorrow you can get to the Almendares river to listen good music and dance as much as you want. You’ll see, everything will be healed after! The hard core this week is Music, ‘cause there’s also the 91st Silvio’s Neighborhoods Tour and a lot of other thing you probably won’t miss. In Visual Arts, a recommendation in Fototeca de Cuba and some promising shows. In Dance, Rosario Cardenas returns to stages with her last work. In Literature, an afternoon dedicated to arts. In Comedy, plenty of laughing in one show. In Cinema, the invitation to enjoy under stars. In FAC, artists from the HWM and more. Here it goes. You know, if you stop by the Almendares, see you around!   5th Edition of the Havana World Music Fest The fifth edition of...

  It is usually thought that the coveted daiquiri, one of Cuba’s emblematic cocktails, was born at El Floridita, Havana’s most famous bar. Its paternity has been attributed, indistinctively, to the well-known bartender Maragato (Emilio González) or to his famous heir Constante (Constantino Ribalaigua). But the truth is as different as distant. Its origin is located 1,000 kilometers from the Cuban capital, in the eastern region of the island. And although an exact date does not exist, its birth occurred during the post-Independence War stage, in 1899 or 1900. Daiquiri is the name of a beach located more than 30 kilometers east of Santiago de Cuba. The U.S. Army landed through this place in 1898 to interfere in the war between the Cuban independence fighters and the Spanish troops. In addition, since the decade before, U.S. corporations were exploiting the iron mines close to the surface next to the riverside. Jennings S. Cox, general manager of the Spanish-American Iron Company was one of the U.S. engineers in that colony, in the late 19th century. At that time, U.S. soldiers, merchants and tourists were regulars in the bars of the island, and Cox was among the devotees of drinks. Moreover, as...