Vendors await customers at their private imported clothing outlet, Havana, Oct. 5, 2013.
November 02, 2013
HAVANA — Cuba closed dozens of home-based movie theaters on Saturday and reaffirmed its plans to end the private sale of imported goods as communist authorities pressed for “order, discipline and obedience” in the growing small business sector.
A government statement issued through official media said home-based theaters and video games will “stop immediately in any type of self-employment,” a local euphemism for small business.
The statement said “the showing of movies, including in 3D salons, and likewise the organization of computer games, has never been authorized.”
The government banned the private sale of imported goods last month, a measure that potentially affects some 20,000 small businesses and their employees who sell clothing, hardware and other goods brought in informally by travelers, some of whom visit the Caribbean island regularly carrying merchandise from the United States, Spain and Latin American countries.
President Raul Castro, who replaced his brother Fidel in 2008, has instituted a series of market-oriented reforms to Cuba’s Soviet style economy where the state still employs 79 percent of the five million-strong labor force.
“These measures are corrections to continue bringing order to this form of management, fight impunity and insist people live up to the law,” the government said on Saturday.
“In no way does this mean a step backward. Quite the contrary, we will continue to decidedly advance in the updating of our economic model,” it said, adding that would only be possible “in an atmosphere of order, discipline and obedience.”
The import ban has created a fury among entrepreneurs and the public who have tired of buying high priced and low quality clothing from state-run establishments.
Saturday’s closing of private theaters will add fuel to the fire as they have been overwhelmingly welcomed by the public.
Marlene, a Havana housewife, said her neighbor was planning to open a 3D salon.
“The state has no 3D theaters, so what is their problem. Sometimes the government seems to want to make our lives worse for the fun of it,” she said, asking her last name not be used.
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NBC News
Cuba shutters private theaters, threatens other businesses
Franklin Reyes / AP file
People watch a 3D movie at a private movie theater in Havana, Cuba, Monday, Oct. 28, 2013.
Cuba closed dozens of home-based movie theaters on Saturday and reaffirmed its plans to end the private sale of imported goods as communist authorities pressed for “order, discipline and obedience” in the growing small business sector.
A government statement issued through official media said home-based theaters and video games will “stop immediately in any type of self employment,” a local euphemism for small business.
The statement said “the showing of movies, including in 3D salons, and likewise the organization of computer games, has never been authorized.”
The government banned the private sale of imported goods last month, a measure that potentially affects some 20,000 small businesses and their employees who sell clothing, hardware and other goods brought in informally by travelers, some of whom visit the Caribbean island regularly carrying merchandise from the United States, Spain and Latin American countries.
President Raul Castro, who replaced his brother Fidel in 2008, has instituted a series of market-oriented reforms to Cuba’s Soviet style economy where the state still employs 79 percent of the 5 million-strong labor force.
“These measures are corrections to continue bringing order to this form of management, fight impunity and insist people live up to the law,” the government said on Saturday.
……….
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