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The legalization of the violation of the human right of identity is already on the table of Cuba’s National Assembly. A Bill to be discussed in July could take away citizenship from Cubans abroad who perform “acts contrary to the high political, economic and social interests” to “Cuba”, allegedly….
This bill is in addition to the Migration and Alien Law, which is being imposed in a scenario marked by a severe and unprecedented economic crisis and by the intensification of repression against Cuban civil society as a whole.
While on the one hand the Migration and Foreigners Law would eliminate the 24-month period of stay abroad and announces the possibility for Cubans to keep the property inherited in Cuba, the Citizenship Law opens the way for the elimination of the nationality of persons abroad by decree.
What the law says
The Migration and Alien Law provides that the regime may strip citizenship from any Cuban who, in its opinion, performs “acts contrary to the high political, economic and social interests of the Republic of Cuba”.
If up to now, the regime decided which Cubans could leave or enter the national territory; in a few months it will also be able to take away that nationality from any person, even if he/she was born in Cuba The draft bill of the Citizenship Law will empower both the ruler Miguel Díaz-Canel and the Ministry of the Interior to strip citizenship from any Cuban.Article 18.1 of the bill, available as of June 24 on the official website of the National Assembly of People’s Power (ANPP), provides that “the President of the Republic and the Minister of the Interior are the authorities in matters of citizenship, competent to resolve administrative proceedings on the acquisition, loss, deprivation, renunciation and recovery of Cuban citizenship”. The former issues the deprivation by means of a Presidential Decree and the latter by means of a Resolution. Both the former and the latter may deprive a Cuban of citizenship at their discretion.
Proyecto Ley de Ciudadania … by Ariana Briceno
Article 55.1 provides that “when any person incurs in grounds for deprivation of citizenship and causes serious damage to the country in relation to national security, endangers the stability of the State, international relations or the general health of the population, the citizenship authority may issue a Presidential Decree without complying with the requirements and formalities for the processing of the file and the provisions of the preceding paragraph”.
For experts, this section is a direct threat to Cubans living abroad who denounce, before international organizations, the human rights violations committed by the regime.
For example, activists who have submitted reports for the United Nations Universal Periodic Review or have denounced practices such as human trafficking to which the regime subjects the professionals it exports could be stripped of their Cuban citizenship, without the regime having to abide by any requirements or formalities.
What the Cuban regime says
“We have not made a law to subtract. These are not projects to subtract, they are projects to continue uniting Cubans,” said First Colonel Mario Méndez Mayedo, chief of this police institution.
However, these draft bills come in a scenario also marked by a migratory stampede unprecedented since 1959, which is draining Cuba of its mainly young labor force.
As of last May, 575,549 Cubans had arrived in the United States since December 2021, when the Nicaraguan regime eliminated the visa requirement for Cubans and the current migration crisis began.
What is said online
The conversation on social networks about the proposed Citizenship Law in Cuba began to gain momentum in the last week. We found, between May 25 and June 25, 653 mentions around the topic. The highest peaks of activity were on June 25 with 104 mentions and on June 18 with 79.
Cuban society talked about the topic mainly on Facebook, where 68.3% of the mentions (446) were recorded, followed by X with 24.81% (162), and then Instagram with 6.89% of the mentions (45).
In this sense, the words most used in the conversation were: Cuban citizenship (50 mentions), national power (47 mentions), migration law (36 mentions), available population (36 mentions), renounce citizenship (21 mentions), transparency access and access to information (both with 13 mentions), among many others.
The weight of the independent and democratic Cuban media was largely responsible for promoting the issue in social networks. For example, the phrase “renouncing citizenship” appeared in several news publications that reported on the possibility of renouncing Cuban citizenship through this bill.
Likewise, “transparency access” and “access to information” stood out in the search because during the same week that the draft Law on Citizenship of Cuba was presented, the draft Law on Transparency and Access to Public Information was also presented, being reviewed by the media in social networks together with both legislative projects.
In turn, three Facebook accounts stood out as those that made the most mentions of the topic during this study period, with the three accounts being linked and amplified among themselves.
In first place is the account of independent Cuban journalist Mario J Pentón with 14 mentions and more than 12,285,868 impressions. In second place, the account of the news media El Toque (with a video in which Mario J Pentón appears) generated 10 mentions on the subject that gathered more than 3,343,700 impressions. Likewise, Martí Noticias (Video of Mario J Pentón with El Toque) also registered 10 mentions in this search, but generated more than 2,596,110 impressions.
Thus, the conversation around the Citizenship Law was guided mostly by civil society actors, highlighting the participation of the media. On this occasion, the ProBox Digital Observatory was able to identify the coordination of actors such as Mario Pentón, El Toque and Martí Noticias to amplify awareness in social networks about the Citizenship Bill promoted by the Cuban regime.
For political analysts, the project constitutes the first step to materialize the stripping of Cuban nationality as a reprisal against those who openly oppose the regime and denounce it abroad, and although the Cuban constitution of 1976 already established causes for the loss of citizenship, until now there has not been a rule that makes the deprivation effective,
That the draft bill of the Citizenship Law will be approved in the next session of the National Assembly seems to be already a fact. In the meantime, the conversation in networks continues in anticipation of the entry into force of a law that could strip the right to citizenship from the opponents of the regime who raise their voices to denounce the violation of Human Rights in the country.
