Alberto Yoan Arego Pulido

“There is an institution, that controls official newspapers, also ‘Juventud Rebelde’ and ‘El Trabajador’ and all these media…once we had a class there, I don’t remember if it was some common class or something else. And one student, who was just finishing his studies of journalism, I was just in the first year, I think, it occurred to him to ask, in that seminar, why we do not have a debate with Yoanni Sánchez? At that time, it was like unreal…well Yoanni was known for her blog ‘Generation Y’ [in Spanish Generación Y; philologist and journalist criticizing the Cuban Government]. But of course, to propose during a class of the official communist periodicals to do something about Yoanni Sánchez. At the end, this student was expelled, and we never saw him again. Many friends from the faculty also had these ideas, that they wanted to fight the Cuban regime in a different way, but no, they did not achieve anything.”

“Well, I would love to dream that Cuba, in a few years, would be free and would change, that hopefully tomorrow everything would pass, but we have been hearing this story for a long time now. When Fidel Castro died [Fidel Castro, after his victory in the Cuban Revolution against the Fulgencio Batista dictatorship in 1959, was president and prime minister of Cuba] in 2016, the situation stayed the same. Everybody was declaring: ‘Yes, finally Cuba is changing,’ emigrants in Miami celebrated: ’Come here, let us celebrate.’ Unfortunately, nothing changed, what a horror, situation did not change. Yes, there are some positives, for example changes through the social media. But the issue of social media, well, the thing is that the Cuban Government at some point wanted to block the internet in Cuba, I do not think they will realize it, because they would take away too many opportunities that can be earned by being present on social media and internet itself. Because ‘Mesas Redondas’ would knock down, ‘Cuba Debate’, ‘Juventud Rebelde’ [official newspapers of the communist regime], on Twitter, on Facebook, anywhere.”

“A private independent newspaper is interested in other topics, different topics. ‘El País’ is considered a left-wing oriented newspaper in Spain, although the most leftists in Spain do not count it as a left oriented, they see it more on the right side of the political spectrum, but rightists see it more on the left side, it is very strange. But of course, the good thing about ‘El País’ is, that it is an independent media that does is not possessed by any political party. Although people say that ‘El Sol’ [another newspaper in Spain] controls it, that PP [Popular Party] controls it, that IBEX 35 [the main benchmark index of the Spanish stock market] controls it. But this freedom, that you are given in ‘El País’, that you can choose your own topics, I did not experience in Cuba. In Cuba you can dedicate yourself only to the topic of the Museum of the Revolution, the Portal Museum of Cuba, or the Seal Museum project, topics extremely boring. You ask yourself, who the hell is interested in these things? In the end, they publish your articles, but with really inconsequential topics.”