Wave of trips to Cuba following the opening from the U.S.
It is estimated that there will be a total of 200,000 crossings by islanders to their homeland to meet with family this year
By Gerardo Arreola
From La Jornada
A CubaNews translation by Will Reissner
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
HAVANA — The desire to see family weighed more heavily than the economic crisis. After Barack Obama opened the doors, Cubans who live in the United States have descended on the island in greater numbers than ever, and this year their trips could reach the unprecedented figure of 200,000, according to Francisco Aruca, a long-time operator of those charter flights.
Aruca, a participant in the dialogues between emigrants and the Cuban government, such as the ones held in 1978, 1994, and 1995, thinks that a new meeting would need to broaden the agenda to include points such as the emigrants’ interests in purchasing homes, establishing a form of medical insurance, or making investments in the island, or the situation of the rafters who left in the past 15 years and that Havana does not allow to return to the island.
The life of Aruca, 68, reflects the fundamental trajectory of recent Cuban history. He supported the insurrection that triumphed in 1959, but he joined with the Catholics who opposed the new regime. He became a prisoner, was sentenced to 30 years in jail and surreptitiously fled the colonial fortress of La Cabaña, taking advantage of a family visiting day. He spent a year and a half in asylum in the Brazilian embassy, then left for the United States, where he earned a degree as an economist and where he worked until the decade of the 1970s he came to the conclusion that the emigrants had to talk to the Cuban government, an idea he put forward in the pages of the magazine Areíto. In 1979, he set up the Marazul charter travel agency, which links the two sides of the Florida straits. Now, in Miami, he has a radio program featuring political commentary, which he shares with the journalist Edmundo García.
Aruca spoke with La Jornada in Havana and recalled that in 1979, during Jimmy Carter’s administration, there was great excitement when 100,000 Cuban travelers from the United States arrived. In the Bill Clinton period there was also a growth in travel, but nothing like now. If the projected arrival of 200,000 Cubans from the United States is reached this year they would make up the second largest group of tourists to the island, behind only the Canadians.
Last April, Obama implemented his campaign promise to eliminate all the restrictions — which George W. Bush had intensified — on travel by Cubans to their country. Aruca says that there are now around 50 weekly flights, counting those that go from Miami to Havana (at least 31), those that land in the provinces of Camagüey, Cienfuegos, Santiago de Cuba, and Holguín, and those arriving in the Cuban capital from New York and Los Angeles.
He recalls that the Bush government’s restrictions were so stifling that Cubans traveled to the island through third countries such as Mexico or the Bahamas. This path allowed only some 10,000 people to fly there per year. In Grand Cayman, the plane to Havana would only leave after the one from Miami arrived, because it arrived filled with Cubans. And he notes that people used subterfuges like pretending that trips were for religious purposes, which were more readily authorized in that period.
Q. Did this change with the present liberalization?
A. Now things that were illegal before have been made legal. Even so, as far as we know, thousands of Cubans continue arriving through third countries. My opinion is that they do this to totally avoid all the hassles that they can face in Miami regarding baggage.
Q. What are the baggage regulations for coming here?
A. In the Bush era they stated more clearly than ever that passengers going on family visits were supposed to take no excess luggage. They have always been allowed 44 pounds of baggage. Above that they are charged excess. We are charging one dollar per pound. Before, the charge was two dollars. Now it is still not clear how much excess baggage one can take and as a result there are people who continue to come through third countries. Some of the regulations deal with exporting products from the United States.
“And if the Treasury Department feels like it, it can say that this excess baggage actually involves the export of products, because they obviously are not personal effects. Therefore we continue having to deal with gray areas, which depend on how they choose to enforce things.”
Q. What has had more influence on Cubans who live in the United States: interest in traveling to Cuba or the weight of the economic crisis?
A. Interest in traveling is paramount. This did not surprise us. Cubans are people for whom their family is very special. The Cubans who arrived at the start of the revolutionary period don’t feel that way, because they did not leave family members behind. The Cubans who arrived until 1961, 1962 brought along everyone including the family cat. The change began, above all, starting in 1980. After that the people who left are very different. And these people could not bring everybody with them and therefore they want to come back.
“I would add that this was shown at the time of the collapse of the socialist world, when we saw that their family and their friends also became their partners. Many of the ovens that made pizzas when the paladares (family restaurants) were opened and many of the tools for personal workshops that were set up to repair automobiles were bought with hard currency, which was sent by family members. In some cases this was done for love and was just handed over, or they did it saying, ‘set aside 20 percent, 30 percent for me’.”
Q. And this is what the surveys show…
A. When they give you responses among Cubans registered to vote… at most, 52 percent are still against allowing trips to Cuba by Cuban families and Americans in total. Now, you do a survey among Cubans in Miami, in Dade Country, Cubans whether they are registered or not registered to vote, 65 percent are saying that even Americans should be allowed to travel. Everything points to the future moving in that direction in Miami. The Cuban right-wing knows it, recognizes it, but that right is a problem at this time.
Q. How long can the Cubans who come from the United States stay here?
A. They can come as often as they want, for however long they wish. Before this regulation Cuba had already established the updated passport [pasaporte habilitado]. The entry permit no longer exists. That could be requested here, directly in Havana, or through the Interests Section, but those on family trips obtained them through Havanatur (Cuban travel agency). When you arrived at the airport they were waiting for you with a list of names. It was a contradiction and offensive, because citizens should not have to ask permission from their government to enter the country. This no longer exists. With an updated passport a Cuban can come. They issue it to you for six years and it is renewed every two, and you can use it from any nation in the world. Someone who comes can stay up to 90 days. That is, on day 89 you spend two days in Mexico and you can return.
Q. As a veteran of the dialogs between the Cuban government and the emigrants, how do you see this process now?
A. A new meeting is pending. The last one, which took place in March 2008, was with people who were on the whole in solidarity with Cuban policy and against the embargo. All the previous ones have always had a political character, in opposition to the U.S. foreign policy, although many people who held that position also had differences with Cuba. Now I would be pleased if they understood on the island that Cubans who live abroad have legitimate points.
Q. For example?
A. For example, that one could come to Cuba and buy a house here, that one could get health services here. You can be sure that an enormous number of Cubans in Miami don’t have those services. I am convinced that the day will come when some insurance company in the United States will authorize hospitalization in Cuba. This would lower costs enormously and, of course, would mean an agreement with Cuba. Other examples: coming to retire, the return of the rafters since 1995, the possibility of investing here…
Q. What return of rafters?
A. Those who left on rafts after the migration agreements of 1994 and 1995. The exact figure is not known. It could be 20,000 or 30,000. These people have not been allowed to come back. For 15 years they have not been able to visit their families. This is worse than the Mariel people who only waited five or six years.
“Our position is that you need to develop a migration policy that ends up taking into account that 95 percent of these people just want to come in peace. Edmundo García was in a meeting that took place a short time ago in New York with the minister of foreign relations, Bruno Rodríguez, and he asked him about this situation. And Rodríguez responded, almost literally, that it is a problem to which a solution must be sought, when and if it does not create a conflict with the United States government. But the United States knows that Cuba does not encourage illegal exits.”
Q. Would a new meeting involve opening the agenda?
A. It would, as a minimum, have to try to find out what those points are. How can the Cuban government more methodically address the needs of its emigrants.
Q. Have the migratory regulations applied in Cuba, such as the exit permit, been dealt with in some of these meetings?
A. Certainly in 1978. Afterwards the community flights were opened. It was one of the agreements. Also some 3,000 political prisoners were freed. In the 1994 and 1995 meetings they again talked about facilitating leaving, but nothing at all about the investment of the emigrants.
Q. What has been said about the next meeting?
A. There has not yet been a public announcement, but it has already been stated on a private level. Bruno Rodríguez told Edmundo that it is planned for January 27, 28, 29. This meeting had already been called for April, then was postponed to November, and now to January. I’m inclined to think that it is going to begin to take steps in the direction of drawing closer to the emigrants. What I don’t know is how far it will go. And there is no agenda yet, as far as I know. Cuba is not known for establishing agendas three months in advance.
Q. How soon do you think before we see authorization for all Americans to be able to travel to Cuba?
A. I am not sure that that will be approved, although there are changes: for the first time the U.S. travel industry, including big companies like Orbitz and associations that represent airlines and tourism companies, are still not saying they are for it, but rather they are working for it to be opened.
Q. The sector is in motion…
A. Yes, actively. Unfortunately, the U.S. political process is very tainted by money. The lobbies make contributions. In the past the rightwing Cuban-American lobby bought the votes of dozens of Democratic members of Congress. I don’t see the opening taking place through the legislative route. I have serious doubts that it would be passed, although it is known that Obama would not veto it. As far as I know, the money that the private travel industry is spending in favor of lifting the prohibition on going to Cuba has been done in compliance with the spirit of the law. The Cuban lobby is expending whatever money it needs to.
Q. How was Clinton able to open things?
A. What Clinton did — and there are people who say that somehow it can be done now — was the people-to-people program, people-to-people visits. It was set up to facilitate relations between professionals, such as architects and engineers, from the United States and their Cuban counterparts. There are analysts and members of Congress who say that this is the way to proceed now. Carter was able to open totally because at that time you did not have
