The National Assembly of People's Power, in its tenth legislature, approved this Thursday the Social Communication Law, during the second extraordinary session that takes place at the Havana Convention Center.
The president of the National Assembly, Esteban Lazo Hernández, explained that the creation of the norm, initially as a Decree-Law and later as a Law, is the result of a broad and rigorous process of collective construction, in which professionals and experts have participated from different disciplines, organizations and institutions until reaching version 34 of the document.
The president of the Institute of Communication and Social Information, Alfonso Noya Martínez, presented the bill to the deputies and affirmed that it recognizes the contribution of social communication to strengthen the unity of the people, consolidate the ideology of our socialist society and defend the independence , sovereignty and security of the homeland, a contribution of greater importance in the scenario of political, ideological, economic, communicational and cultural war that the Cuban Revolution is facing.
"The project that was presented to Parliament followed the most democratic path, that of collective construction," he said.
The transition to the present version included, from July to October 2022, the carrying out throughout the country of the process of specialized consultations of the Draft Law in which university students and professors, journalists, artists, social communicators and other professionals, delegates participated to the Municipal Assemblies of People's Power and deputies, political and government leaders, businessmen and new economic actors.
He added that thousands of opinions and a group of considerations received through email and other digital channels were derived from the process.
The new Project - from the By How Many to the Final Provisions - registers 69 changes of content and form, which represent a 59.48% transformation with respect to the original text of version 33 submitted to the second consultation with the deputies.
Noya Martínez stressed that version 34 of the Social Communication Bill that was submitted for consideration by the deputies this Thursday "is more solid, mature and comprehensive" than the one delivered in December to the National Assembly of People's Power.
It has a higher level of academic, professional and social consensus, achieved on the basis of dialogue, attention to each opinion and the breadth of the democratic exercise of deconstruction and enrichment of the norm, he argued.
The purpose of the Law is to regulate the Social Communication System for the strategic and integrated management of social communication processes in the organizational, media and community spheres, for political, public good, organizational and commercial purposes, both in physical public spaces as in digital.
It also includes establishing the principles of organization and operation for all social communication media in the country.
The deputy José Luis Toledo Santander read out the opinion on the Social Communication Law project, and underlined the extensive process of discussion to which the norm was submitted, which allowed a notable enrichment of the content.
A better conceived document has been achieved in its concepts and with greater clarity in its content, assuming social communication as the basis of human communication, he said.
The country recognizes, through this bill, the importance of legislating in a single legal body everything related to communication, combining the different areas that it includes, such as the media, organizational, commercial and institutional, he commented.
The first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, appreciated the debate that took place prior to the approval of the law, especially the criteria of young and prepared deputies.
This legal standard, he said, is the result of a long process of debate and social revision, as a consequence of the development of the so-called information and knowledge society. He added that the drafting of the articles of this law necessarily has a regulatory approach.
"Its greatest value lies in the recognition of the potential and benefits of Social Communication for the development of the country," he commented. "The long period of confrontation and the aggressiveness that characterizes the criminal policy of the US government impacts all areas of Cuban society and, in particular, communication."
The president maintained that today it is fundamentally the design of a framework of possibilities that point -he indicated- to the development of the social communication system in Cuba, and that we have also conceived as one of the pillars of institutional and community government management, and not only media or specifically associated with the press.
Díaz-Canel said that the law provides a more comprehensive vision of what communication is, and allows its interpretation in the digital sphere, as well as its integration with the rest of the system due to the complexity of the scenario in which it takes place, since this evolves very quickly.
He highlighted the importance of recognizing and including the role and place of people in the organizational, media and community spheres, since all those who participate in the communication processes influence, interact, relate, have levels of influence and inputs, directly or indirectly, in its operating logic, and decide to some degree the effectiveness of communication.
On the other hand, he said, these areas only make sense in their interrelation with people from the actions that are designed for them, with them, or taking into account their characteristics and/or needs.
"It is fundamental and necessary that, together with this law and in favor of its more effective implementation, education for communication and media and information literacy of people in our country be promoted and promoted."
The president considered it necessary to understand "the urgent need to provide the population with knowledge, skills and tools for an understanding and critical assessment of the logic of how the media operate, in addition to promoting and facilitating access to them and to communication technologies." information and communications”.
“Recognizing and pondering communication education is crucial to assume the new communication processes that are manifested today, especially in the digital space, including those that exist and those that we wish to create or strengthen as a socialist society”.
Díaz-Canel affirmed that more than two thirds of the global population today accesses the Internet with some regularity, but this space is increasingly dominated by a small group of transnationals, and this level of concentration of consumption and platforms that are not owned public and that establish restrictions to the practices of the users is based on their interests.
He pointed out that the legal norm has a strong impact on national security, in a context of intense media warfare.
In addition, the president recalled that the law mentions the Constitution of the Republic on more than 20 occasions.
The law, he said, must become a permanent working instrument to understand that the end is not the message, but the essential utility of communication management based on strategic objectives.
The president added that this legislation should allow us to overcome the gaps and overcome the institutional inertia that negatively affects the public servants responsible for informing the population. He warned that it is up to the press to inform the population responsibly.
The deputies joined from the Conventions Center in condemning the attacks against the musical group Buena Fe in Barcelona, who were victims of the hatred of counterrevolutionaries backed by the fascist forces of Europe and the ultra-right of Miami, with the complicity and funding from the United States government.
The deputy and director of the Juventud Rebelde newspaper, Yoerkis Sánchez, said that this law is valuable because it has contributions from deputies from two legislatures of the ANPP.
He clarified that it is not a trade union norm limited to a group or set of people, it is a law for "everyone and for the good of all", because it cuts across different social processes that place citizens at the center.
For media organizations, he said, more possibilities are established to sustain their development and promote the modernization of our media. He added that the law includes issues such as advertising and sponsorship. "These elements are not in contradiction with our socialist values."
Ailyn Fables Estrada specified that the law by itself is not enough, she said that other legal instruments are needed to complement it. Among them, the law on transparency and access to information that will be approved and submitted to Parliament for discussion in this legislative schedule, or a much-needed data law in our country.
It is a perfectible law like any human work, but above all things, it is a timely and pertinent useful law, he stressed.
“Every month new technologies appear, millions of pieces of data are generated every minute, connected devices grow exponentially, and our children and young people spend more than half of their waking time connected and on the Internet.”
The deputy commented that during the consultation process she proposed to explicitly incorporate education, in addition to higher education, in article 93.2 of chapter 13 of Training, preparation and improvement in Social Communication, as it is urgent that our children and young people learn methods and techniques to build a culture of dialogue that allows them to communicate correctly.
Deputy Leydis María Labrador insisted on the need to understand the responsibilities of many officials and managers to seriously and courageously respond to the concerns of the population.
She alerted the importance of using social communicators, of giving these professionals the role and recognition they deserve. "Many times we have a social communicator, for several months, working on a communication strategy and then we put it away."
She added that the law states that there are people who are obliged to provide information. “These people must not only inform, but also know how to communicate and they must have the subjective tools to be able to face the communication processes”.
The deputy for the municipality of Trinidad, Rosa Miriam Elizalde, stressed that "this is a historic law", because "it is the first Law in the field of Communication, directly derived from the Constitution, that Cuba will have in more than a century."
She highlighted that the last law related to some of the elements of communication -in this case, a regulation of journalistic activity- dates from Colonial times, that is, "the most lasting previous law that had to do with one of the components of the communication system in Cuba was issued in 1886, the Printing Law, which regulated journalistic production for Cuba and Puerto Rico.
"Obviously there was not a total legal vacuum," the professor said, but rather "second-order laws, administrative regulations, and a brief period in which, after the coup d'état by Fulgencio Batista, in 1952, the Ministry of Propaganda was created, which would derive in the Ministry of Information”.
“This Ministry said that lasted a few months, until the assault on the Moncada barracks in 1953. It was dedicated almost exclusively to censorship, to prevent the Cuban population from seeing the bodies of murdered youths, the torture and other horrible crimes that were committed and produced until the triumph of the Revolution in 1959”.
"This is a fact that the nostalgic Batista supporters who inhabit that area of the 'cyber-gossip,' of which congressman Arnaldo Rodríguez spoke a moment ago, tend to deliberately ignore," Elizalde stressed.
The vice president of the Union of Cuban Journalists (Upec) emphasized that it is "the first higher law derived directly from a socialist Constitution."
In this sense, she pointed out "the historical importance of this law goes far beyond our geography."
She commented that this law is also historic because it is the first regulation in Latin America that transcends the sectoral, that artificial division between content, channels, infrastructure, communication actors, communication services... It solves this problem that comes from the analog world, she added.
It also favors a systemic, structural response to the enormous challenges we are experiencing and the serious problems accumulated in the management of our public communication system.
“A system –Elizalde continued - that, for the first time, will acquire tools to strengthen its communication processes; the law will allow it to comply with its social mandates, it will also strengthen innovation”.
The norm "also places the State in the capacity of mediator and guarantor of the rights of Cuban citizens in the face of the excesses of international companies with economic power and social control never seen before."
Other deputies stressed that the standard responds to a desire of the sector and that the great challenge now is its application, how we will be able to implement it and appropriate what it proposes.
They also insisted on the importance of the responsible use of cyberspace, both personally and institutionally, due to the ideological struggle to which Cuba is constantly subjected.
Daicar Saladrigas González, director of the Adelante newspaper, referred to the current material situation in the media in the country that, although it does not impede their work, does make it difficult, especially in terms of access to technology.
She affirmed that the legal norm reinforces citizen rights and that it allows the preservation of the nation's cultural heritage.