Interviews with Ernesto Hernandez Busto

The “ordinary” Cuban, as they say, “the common Cuban” is very suspicious of any social initiative, because he’s had enough of the official propaganda; he identifies any political idea, and even any civil movement, he automatically identifies it with the government and what the government has been doing. So many times those people just distance themselves from that discourse and they behave apathetically. So that´s something important, that is a major challenge, not only winning in numbers, but convincing and persuading, rebuild that damaged tissue by years of totalitarianism, and to reconnect people. There are reasons to be optimistic in that sense. The relationship that the Cuban people have, and I’m not just talking about bloggers, I’m talking about the regular Cuban, with information has changed.

These days, very curious phenomena have been seen, like, people who have had a cell phone for only a few months use that phone to document the police brutality in a movie theater, for example. And they feel that information is valuable; it is a weapon for them. The rappers movement in Cuba is starting to generate momentum, I would not say of social commitment, but it goes against the apathy that the Cuban government had created, which is one of the main weapons, to keep people engaged in the most basic levels of survival: getting food, finding ways to “solve” as they say in Cuba, the “everyday” and not to worry about anything else on a bit deeper level, or that has a collective vision.

I think this is one of the main challenges for the people who are doing something in Cuba. Now, for us, who live outside of Cuba, let’s say that it is very difficult to make a career as an opposition figure, because on one hand, you are subject to the allegations of foreign funding, and on the other hand, the level of real action is limited by mechanisms of listening, monitoring– then we must act almost blind, right?

It’s very difficult to communicate freely with people that want to do something in Cuba, and also, in Cuba there has always been this feeling that the legitimate change is the change that comes from within, you know, they have an idea that the exile community cannot play an important role. I believe that new technologies may contribute to undoing that myth.

I´ve been blogging about Cuban issues for almost four years and now I think, not only because of the level of audience that my blog has, but also due to the level of credibility that it has, it’s used as a daily source for almost all foreign journalists on the island. I know it, because I see where they are getting connected. In Cuba the connection points, or access points, because they are not telephone companies like in any other country, always show the name of the institution that is providing the Internet access, it shows in any cyber statistics. So, I see who the people connecting are. People who connect are often these reporters that are inside Cuba, but go to a blog that is outside Cuba to find out what the menu of news is. So I think that kind of pressure has been important.

Ernesto Hernández Busto is an essayist, journalist and blogger and a recognized authority on technology and democracy. He was born in Havana, Cuba in 1968.

As a young man, he became active in the Paideia movement, a group of artists and writers that sought to reform cultural policy in Cuba. The response of security forces to this group of young intellectuals influenced his decision to emigrate. At the age of 21, he left Cuba “to escape the oppressive atmosphere of a totalitarian society, which was suffocating in all areas of life.”

From 1992 to 1999, he lived in Mexico, where we wrote for Vuelta magazine, edited by Octavio Paz, as well as other literary journals and publications. Since 1999, he has lived in Barcelona, Spain, where he works as an editor, translator and journalist.

His books include ‘Perfiles derechos. Fisonomías del escritor reaccionario’ (Barcelona, 2004; III “Casa de América” essay prize) and ‘Inventario de saldos. Apuntes sobre literatura cubana’ (Madrid, 2005). He has also published literary translations from Italian, Russian, French and Portuguese.

Since 2006, he has edited and published Penúltimos Días (www.penultimosdias.com), one of the most important websites on Cuban issues, with more than 70 contributors in 12 countries and over 10 million page views. He has participated in various forums on digital activism as “Internet at Liberty 2010” (organized by Google and the European Central University) and “Personal Democracy Forum Latin America,” among others. His blog is widely recognized as among the most authoritative and comprehensive websites covering events in Cuba.

He wrote the chapters on Cuba’s for Freedom House’s “Freedom on the Net” report (2010 and 2011). He is a frequent contributor to the Spanish newspaper El País, on policy and technology.

Read his blog at www.penultimosdias.com and follow him on Twitter: @penultimosdias