Author who complained of racism demoted

HAVANA (CMC)

A Cuban author who wrote about racism in the country has been demoted from his top job at the government-controlled Casa de las Americas book publishers.

Last month, Roberto Zurbano, editor of the publishing house, wrote a critical article in The New York Times opinion section about what he described as persistent racial inequality in Cuba.

In the article, published on March 23, Zurbano described a long history of racial discrimination against blacks on the island, stating that "racial exclusion continued after Cuba became independent in 1902, and a half-century of revolution since 1959 has been unable to overcome it."

NOT SURPRISED

Maria Ileana Faguaga Iglesia, a Havana academic who specialises in black studies, said she was not surprised by Zurbano's demotion.

"It would have been news if he was NOT fired," she told reporters here. "This ratifies for me their (Cuban Government) lack of understanding and tolerance for diversity, for the range of all the problems that Cuba faces in all areas - racial, social, political and economic."

Faguaga said Zurbano, an acquaintance and neighbour battled often at Casa de las Americas to publish more books on black issues and especially the works of Frantz Fanon, a black, Martinique-born Marxist and revolutionary.

The Havana Times said Zurbano was "relieved" of his job as an editor and publisher, selecting books to be published, and transferred to a lesser job during a meeting of the Cuba chapter of the Regional Coordination of Afro-descendants in Latin America and the Caribbean (ARAAC).

An ARAAC statement in the paper did not mention Zurbano by name but said it "resolutely supports the free expression of ideas by all its activists" and opposes any "repressive or obstructive measures against any participants in such polemics."

ARAAC member Esteban Morales confirmed that Zurbano, who also writes poetry and essays, has been demoted by Casa de las Americans.

Zurbano "of course has the right to give his opinion," Morales told reporters. "Casa de las Americas, in any case, has the right to reassign or dismiss any of its employees." He's not been kicked out of Casa. Casa has simply removed him from that job."

Morales, a well-known Havana economist, was himself kicked out of the Communist Party in 2010 after penning an Internet column in which he complained about Cuba's burgeoning corruption. He was reinstated in 2011.