Maria Garriga, Register Staff
07/31/2007
NEW HAVEN — A pair of professors at Southern Connecticut State
University traveled to Cuba recently, seeking clues to the future of
press freedoms in Venezuela.
The U.S. government officially bans Americans from going to Cuba under
most circumstances, but Leon Yacher, a geography professor, and Joseph
Manzella, chairman of the anthropology department, have licenses from
the federal Department of Treasury to do research in Cuba.
"We are looking for the influence of the Cuban model on the Venezuelan
media," said Manzella, author of "The Struggle to Revitalize America's
Newspapers."
They had last visited the island in 1993.
Cuba, a nation of 11.3 million, has been under the rule of Fidel Castro
and his brother Raul since 1959, when the two led a revolution that
ousted Fulgencio Batista, a U.S.-backed dictator. The Castro brothers
subsequently imposed a socialist regime and assumed total control of the
nation's press.
The professors said they were fascinated by the Cubans' extensive
knowledge of current events in the United States.
Cuba's international version of Granma, its leading newspaper, loaded
its front page recently with stories that referred to or focused on the
United States. The top story had Raul Castro declaring his willingness
for dialogue with the United States, which was followed by a story
analyzing potential nominees for the U.S. presidential primaries in 2008.
The Cubans also expressed concern about the anti-immigration backlash in
the United States and a great admiration for Al Gore. Gore's 2006
documentary on global warming, "An Inconvenient Truth," was broadcast
several times during their trip, they said.
The two also were able to interview Cuban media officials, including a
four-hour interview with a senior editor at Communist Party-controlled
Granma.
While the United States' broadcasts do make it to Cuba, the Cuban media
filter the news reports to reflect what the government wants people to
see, Manzella said.
Both said they were struck by the accuracy of the Cuban media, which
often broadcast excerpts from American media reports. "Think of the
Cuban media as a well-informed version of Fox News," Manzella said.
"They don't lie. They just don't tell you the other side of the story,"
Yacher said.
Cuba is ranked as one of the most repressive countries in the world
toward press freedom by several journalism organizations. The island
nation could be the blueprint used by Hugo Chavez as he continues to
consolidate power in Venezuela, they said.
While most media attention focused on the Venezuelan government's recent
refusal to renew the broadcast license of a television station critical
of the Chavez administration, few noted that several newspapers had
already been closed down by the government in Venezuela's rural provinces.
"Chavez has publicly called Castro his father. The Venezuelans have no
idea in five years that you will have a Venezuelan model of Cuba,"
Yacher said.
Yacher spent more than three weeks in Cuba, Manzella five days. They
plan to include their research in a book about international press
freedom with the tentative title, "Eyes on the World," which compare
conditions in Indonesia, South Africa, Venezuela and Kyrgyzstan (an
Asian nation wedged between Kazakhstan and China.)
http://www.nhregister.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=18645387&BRD=1281&PAG=461&dept_id=7576&rfi=6
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