CRIME-CUBA: Wave of Violence Accompanies Economic Crisis

By Dalia Acosta Reprint | | Print |

Dalia Acosta

HAVANA, Oct 23 1998 (IPS) - Rumours, police actions and official statements have spread alarm among residents of Cuba’s capital, caught in an unprecedented wave of violence.

In the streets of downtown Havana, it’s easy to spot the people who make a living from prostitution, harassing tourists, illegally selling just about anything, and even assaulting unsuspecting strollers.

“We are losing one of the few good things that we Cubans had left: security,” said Magalys Guzman, a 38-year-old engineer who decided several months ago to put metal guards on the door and windows of her apartment.

With a monthly salary of 400 Cuban pesos (about 20 dollars, according to the exchange rate at state-sanctioned cambios), Guzman paid 100 dollars for the bars on her door and 35 dollars for each of the five window guards. To do this, she said, she spent all the money her brother in the United States sent her for basic goods that can be bought only in dollars. “But,” said the engineer, who lives with her two children, “it is better to take precautions than to be sorry later.”

Violence is growing in Cuba in tandem with the economic crisis the country has been enduring for the past eight years. Media sources say it could become a ‘fifth column’ for those seeking to see Cuba’s socialist model fail.

In Cuba, an island with a population of just over 11 million, 7.8 homicides were registered for every 100,000 inhabitants in 1995, more than double the rate for the 1970s, according to Public Health Ministry statistics. The number of victims fell to 6.8 per 100,000 last year, when the rate was 10.5 homicides per 100,000 for men, and three per 100,000 among women.

Experts and officials are concerned about the incidence of crime today, which is much higher than it was only a few years ago, although they also say it is insignificant compared to the rates in the rest of Latin America.

The Pan American Health Organization, which considers violence a public health problem, says there are 150 homicides per 100,000 persons in El Salvador and Guatemala, while Colombia’s rate is 89.5 per 100,000.

“Robbery with violence, break-ins, muggings of both foreigners and locals, and cattle rustling and slaughter are some of the commonest illegal acts,” said ‘Juventud Rebelde’, the newspaper of the Union of Young Communists.

The weekly pointed out that common criminals were resorting to new crimes and tactics, including prostitution, white collar crime, international drug trafficking, paedophilia and child pornography.

Sixty percent of Cuban prostitutes have at least one pimp, said the secretary of the Communist Party in Havana, Esteban Lazo. He called for “those who use to crime to live the easy life” to be wiped out.

As part of a clean-up campaign called ‘Operation Scum’, four night spots in Havana were shut down last week “until further notice”, in an effort to stop prostitution and the sale of drugs in such establishments.

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Alejandro Gonzalez said the official campaign against crime, far from affecting tourism, would boost the industry, since it aims to guarantee peace.

Rumors which have not been confirmed by the local press had it that on one weekend, there were two killings, an eight-year-old girl was kidnapped, and a meat-delivery truck was attacked, as was a hamburger restaurant.

The economic crisis which began in 1990, has caused a serious decline in the standard of living, worsened social inequalities, increased the value of the dollar vis-a-vis the Cuban peso, and created fertile ground for economic and petty crime, experts say.

Studies point out that Cuban criminals tend to be unemployed, low-skilled workers and people with anti-social habits or behaviour, such as alcoholism and participation in fights and public scandals.

The National Survey on Internal Migration, concluded last year, showed that with the worsening of the crisis, there was an increase in internal migration to Havana, to more than 20,000 persons people a year.

The majority of these migrants did not seek employment in the capital, did not improve their standard of living, but devoted themselves mostly to illicit activities in the underground market, according to the study.

Authorities acknowledge the increase in crime, both in terms of numbers and degree of severity, but they have not released the official statistics on robberies, assaults and murders.

The Ministry of the Interior reported a rate of 34 crimes an hour between January and June 1990. Of every five crimes, one was classified as serious, and almost 70 percent of the perpetrators were between the ages of 16 and 30.

Although by 1993 there was already talk of “an official campaign against crime”, only now is the situation beginning to really worry the population, especially in Havana.

Residents of the capital avoid riding bicycles at night, for fear of thieves who would do anything to get – and later resell – one of the most desired means of transportation in these years of crisis.

Many people choose to stay home at night watching television. If they go out, they prefer to do so with another person or in a group, and no one walks around alone late on the streets of Havana unless it’s absolutely necessary.

“The situation today requires urgent measures and these are, above all, an increase in the number and training of police,” said Juventud Rebelde, acknowledging also that it will take “a long time to eradicate crime”.