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C u b a 1. CONSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK The Party has a prior and superior right to that of the citizen
as purveyor of information. The civil and political rights of the
citizen are subordinate to the aims of the socialist society and
determined by material conditions. They are not inherent to the
person nor to the citizen. Article 53 of the Constitution of the Republic of 1976 recognizes
freedom of expression and of the press, subject to the aims of the
socialist society. Article 62 of the Constitution limits it even
further and Article 5 places the Party above society and above the
state for it to guide and organize all the common efforts that are
made in pursuance of the well-being of society. There is no law providing for or prohibiting censorship. The
role of censor of information is carried out by the Department of
Revolutionary Orientation (DOR) under the Ideological Secretariat
of the Communist Party of Cuba?s Politburo. This Department was
created in the mid-1960s, at the time with the name of Revolutionary
Orientation Commission (COR), and handles propaganda and ideology
for the government and designs and carries out official policy concerning
the news media. Journalists who stray from the official line can be expelled
from their workplace and even jailed. Juan Orlando Pérez, from the
Havana weekly Tribuna de La Habana, was fired just 48 hours
after the December 22, 1995, edition ran an article by him titled
?Who said you had to give money for the Martí exercise books?? which
did not meet the COR?s approval. Also dismissed were the publication?s
editor, Angel Zúñiga Suárez, managing editor, Argentina Jiménez
Rodríguez and news editor, María Elena Pacheco. State control of information and the expression of ideas is
in sharp contrast to the level of education in the country. In Cuba,
people have a right to education but not information. As a result
of the political changes in the former Communist countries, a debate
arose among Cuban journalists on the need to rethink information
policy. When the first criticisms appeared in the press blaming
national institutions for the economic and social upheaval in the
country, the quantity and frequency of periodicals decreased, newsprint
was restricted to authorized publications and journalists regarded
as ?argumentative? were reassigned to other duties or simply sent
home. In addition, the president of the Cuban Journalists Union
(UPEC) had his pass to cover the Cabinet meetings revoked to avoid
any leak of news about the problems the nation was having. During UPEC?s 6th Congress in October 1986, a top agenda item
was ?journalists? self-censorship when reporting,? saying that this
self-censorship was needed because of ?the isolation, hostility,
aggression and ongoing blockade to which Cuba had been subjected
since the triumph of the Revolution.? It added: ?Discretion was
? and can still be ? a weapon in defense of our interests and for
the security of the country.? Freedom of the press is recognized as a right under the national
Constitution ? though conditionally ? but it is not guaranteed as
a natural corollary to freedom of expression and information. Journalists
have no freedom and independence before the government, Communist
Party, the Revolution and the state, the latter being the only owner
of the means of production. Cuban journalists practice their profession
with no conscience clause. The official policy of the government and Party regarding the
press and the limits within which it may exercise its freedoms is
expressed in the following statement: ?The critical role of the press as ?the fourth estate? is not
necessary for Cuban revolutionary democracy.? (Fidel Castro speaking
at the Second Plenary of the Communist Party of Cuba?s Central Committee,
as published in Cuba Socialista of Havana 6 (23), September-October
1986, reprinted in Rectificación, Fidel Castro on the process of
rectification in Cuba (1986-1990), Thematic Selection, Verde Olivo
Collection, Editora Política, Havana, 1990, pp 71-75. Already the draft program for the Communist Party of Cuba?s
6th Congress in 1997 had declared that the news media and educational
and cultural institutions ?face the biggest challenge ? to guarantee
the continuation of socialist, patriotic, anti-imperialist views
and values, those of the Revolution itself, in future generations
of Cubans.?
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