Cuba: Editor of “Granma” Daily Replaced
HAVANA TIMES – Lázaro Barredo, editor of the newspaper Granma, official organ of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC), has been relieved of his duties.
According to wholly reliable sources, Barredo was notified Tuesday of his removal, which obviously was ordered by high officials in the PCC. Replacing him, the same sources said, is Pelayo Terry, who until now edited the newspaper Juventud Rebelde (JR), organ of the Young Communists (UJC).
The new editor of JR will be the journalist Marina Menéndez Quintero, a professional with a long trajectory in that newspaper.
In the local journalistic world, where the news has spread and is the cause of much comment, the most remarkable aspect is the suddenness of the decision and the question of whether the replacement of Granma’s editor and the rise of new executives will be followed by changes in the policy drafted for the press by the PCC.
“We cannot say if this will mean a change in names, or an opening toward journalism attune to the national reality, where the topics that appeal to and affect the population may be reflected, discussed and analyzed from different perspectives,” a media professional told Progreso Weekly.
NOTE: On Wednesday morning Granma published the following information about the change in its top management position.
Pelayo Terry Cuervo, new director of Granma Newspaper
The Politburo of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party agreed to “liberate” for the purpose of renovation, Lazaro Barredo Mediana as the director of Granma newspaper, position he has held for almost eight years.
In substitution of Barredo is comrade Pelayo Terry, who at the time of this appointment was acting as the director of Juventud Rebelde newspaper. He has a long career as a journalist, war correspondent in Ethiopia and has held different posts in the Cuban print media.
The new director of Juventud Rebelde is comrade Marina Menendez Quintero, who while working for that newspaper had gone from being a journalist to assistant director. She has served as a correspondent in Nicaragua and Venezuela.
Lets hope GRANMA will soon have the livelier format and content characteristic of JR, (and some of the provincial papers, too, not to mention many blogs, such as Joven Cuba). JR has a greater variety of features, columnists, and also allows lively comments by readers after most articles; hence, dialogue characterizes JR, while official announcements and pronunciamentos characterize GRANMA, making it a real snooze, like reading the CONGRESSIONAL RECORD up here (although even GRANMA, upon occasion, had some interesting features, especially in the arts, culture and social analysis; these, however were usually contributed by guests, rather than staff writers.
How so? The editor of Granma is hardly a position of prominence.
The stain of racism in Cuba will not be removed by the promotion of one black man to Editor of Granma. Obama as POTUS has done little to move the ball forward in the US. That said, depending upon Terry Cuervo’s views on moving the media towards more independent and balanced reporting, it remains to be seen if this appointment will be meaningful to eradicating Cuban racism or simply, as in the case of Esteban Lazo, the new President of the rubber-stamp National Assembly, just a black-faced placeholder.
Waiting for the comments from those who routinely point out the alleged absence of Blacks from positions of prominence in Cuba …