Responses to articles on Radio-TV Martí
Carlos Alberto Montaner
I have learned, via the
Internet in Madrid, that I have been included in a story over an alleged
conflict of interest that involves local journalists in Miami who work for
The Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald and who simultaneously contribute to
Radio-TV Martí. All of those people, to be sure, have a well-earned
reputation for honesty and probity and would never sell their pens to anyone.
Why was my name included in
that report? I don't live in Miami, and I don't work at The Miami Herald or
El Nuevo Herald, nor am I subject to their regulations. I'm not even a free-lancer
for these publications. The Herald, like 60 other publications in Europe,
the United States and Latin America, among them some radio stations, buys my
column from Firmas Press, the agency that distributes my writings.
Some years ago, Radio Martí,
like any other communications outlet, became interested in my column and in
the topics I analyze, and they hired me to do a 20-minute commentary by
telephone once a week for Cuban listeners without access to a free press nor
to my column that appears in the McClatchy newspapers. For those
commentaries, they would pay $100, which is the official and obligatory
stipulated amount of remuneration. This is almost a symbolic figure, well
below the amount paid by others who publish the column. Of course, there
wasn't the slightest condition or suggestion, and if there had been I
wouldn't have accepted it. I would have, and I have, as much freedom as I
exercise in my weekly column.
Contributing to breaking the
boycott on information that exists in Cuba, far from being a conflict of
interest, is the duty and responsibility of any Cuban journalist who truly
loves liberty. To use the phrase of [TV reporter] Juan Manuel Cao, more than
a conflict of interest, it is a coincidence of interests. Radio-TV Martí
wants Cubans to be freely informed. So do I. Where's the problem?
The way in which the
information was presented, as if some dark criminal plot had been uncovered,
suggests that my honesty as a writer has been compromised by those
commentaries I write for the Cuban people. That is something unfair,
ludicrous, offensive and false, as if someone had claimed that my opinions
on social and economic issues should not be taken into account because I
have sold out to big money and the bankers.
Thank you for publishing
this letter. I owe this explanation to my readers because my honesty and
credibility, the basic elements of the profession to which I have devoted my
life, have been unfairly called into question.
CARLOS ALBERTO MONTANER,
syndicated columnist, Firmas Press, Madrid, Spain
September 12, 2006
Imprimir
esta página
