Caribbean & Central America - September 2016 (ISSN 1741-4458)

Josefina Vidal, director general for US relations at Cuba’s foreign ministry, was critical of a 12-13 September conference on the Internet in Cuba as yet another act of interference by the US. “The illegal use of radio and television against Cuba is not enough for them, they insist on the use of the Internet as a weapon of subversion”, Vidal tweeted. Since his first moves towards US re-engagement with Cuba back in 2009, President Barack Obama has posited improved access for Cubans to the Internet and telecommunications as key to White House policy ambitions to promote ‘people-to-people’ contacts.

In April 2009, Obama announced changes under which US telecommunications providers would be able to establish fibre-optic cable and satellite facilities linking the US and Cuba, as well as request licences to enter into and operate under roaming service agreements with Cuban providers. Restrictions were lifted on exports to Cuba of certain communications hardware and software, such as mobile phone systems, computers, software and satellite receivers, as well as articles and services to establish and upgrade communications systems.

Additionally, US satellite radio and satellite television service providers could get a licence to provide services to customers in Cuba. Persons under US jurisdiction would be allowed to activate and pay US or third-country service providers for telecommunications, satellite radio, or satellite TV services provided to individuals in Cuba, except for certain senior Communist Party and Cuban government officials.

Obama’s predecessor, President George Bush (2001-2009), in 2008 amended US regulations in order to allow Cuban-Americans to send mobile phones to family members in Cuba. He also permitted faith-based organisations and non-profit groups working with Cuba to provide computers and Internet access to the Cuban people. That move was in response to President Raúl Castro’s decision the same year to lift the ban on the use of mobile phones by Cuban citizens, as part of his plans to ‘update’ the Cuban economy.

In January 2015, the US Treasury Department effectively formalised and allowed to take practical working effect the Obama government’s April 2009 changes, legally authorising US telecoms companies to do business with Cuba.

Since then, there has been something of a race by US and other international telecoms firms to do deals with Cuba’s state telecoms (and Internet) provider, Empresa De Telecomunicaciones de Cuba (Etecesa). IDT Corp of New Jersey (US) was quick off the mark. In February 2015, it signed a deal with the state provider for direct mobile calls between the US and Cuba. In the past year, the US firms Sprint and Verizon, plus the German operator T-Mobile, have followed suit, signing agreements with Etecesa for voice, text and data roaming. In late August, the US giant AT&T also announced a deal with Etecesa on voice, text and data-roaming. AT&T customers thus will be able to text and call Cuba directly. Data roaming will also be available on the island, according to the company, meaning that AT&T customers visiting Cuba will have access to voice, text and data roaming without having to change a SIM card. AT&T said it would specify available wireless roaming areas and pricing on the island at a later date. And most recently, in mid-September, Claro Puerto Rico (owned by the Mexican giant América Movil) also announced a new voice, text and data roaming agreement with Etecesa.

In terms of the Obama administration’s policy objectives, these deals by US and other providers will facilitate people-to-people exchanges simply by virtue of allowing Cuban Americans visiting the island to have access to ‘regular’ high-speed Internet, while Cubans lucky enough to have family members in the US will also be able to avail of (faster) mobile Internet (on the smart phones sent to them from Miami). And more general (licensed) US tourism to Cuba will also benefit. Finally, the deals will also help to facilitate increased business and commercial relations between the two neighbours. While the economic benefits may not be considerable initially, having these agreements in place now is also an advance play by the providers ahead of the anticipated removal of the US economic embargo on Cuba, upon which they would be in a strong position to invest big time on the island.

What these and other latest developments (such as the re-start of commercial US flights to Cuba) demonstrate is that US corporate interests are committed to the 11m strong Cuban market, in anticipation of its full or partial liberalisation and the removal of the embargo, which they envisage within a 5-10 year horizon. Any efforts by either US Republicans or Democrats on Capitol Hill to pull back on the Obama reforms would be likely to face steep opposition. Even Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee this year, has hinted that he would not block the changes to date, albeit he has mentioned toughening up US conditions. At the same time, Trump has also suggested a ‘Trump Tower’ for Havana.

Josefina Vidal is not the first to accuse the US of using communications technology to ‘subvert’ the Revolution. Cuba has long complained about surreptitious efforts by the US – ranging from the Miami-based Radio Martí broadcasts to the ill-fated smuggling of computer equipment and satellite phones by the US government sub contractor Alan Gross (detained in 2009 and held for five years) and the invariably-comical revelations of covert operations masterminded – to little success – by a succession of apparently-hapless US government agencies.

• Eric Schmidt – an early Cuba adopter

Following his widely publicised trip to Cuba in 2014, which took place months before the official US-Cuba diplomatic rapprochement in December that year, Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt stated: “The ‘blockade’ makes absolutely no sense to US interests: if you wish the country to modernise, the best way to do this is to empower the citizens with smart phones…encourage freedom of expression and put information tools into the hands of Cubans directly”.