By Johannes Werner
When news broke about the Obama Administration’s appointment of Dick Lobo as head of the International Broadcasting Bureau, the agency that oversees Voice of America and Radio/TV Marti, I wasn’t sure whether the Tampa native and grandson of Cuban immigrants deserved congratulations or condolences.
Congratulations, of course, are due when the president picks you to run a government agency with a $717 million budget and 3,800 employees.
But many in the reality-based community argue that the agency the 73-year old was picked to run is a prime example of what’s wrong with the way the United States projects its power abroad.
While nearly nobody objects to using taxpayer-funded media to beam a nicer image of the United States of America to the rest of the world, it’s an altogether different story when the government tries to tell other people how to view themselves, using military airplanes to get the story across.
Before starting his new job, Lobo must pass what will at the least be a painful Senate confirmation process. But the real pain may start when the soft-spoken career broadcast administrator begins to fiddle with Radio/TV Marti. Since 1985, the taxpayer-funded Miami station reproduces a heavily slanted view of Cuban reality, with a signal that only a handful of people can pick up.
Responding to Cuban jamming, the Bush Administration in Spring 2006 began to beam the signal from a dedicated broadcast aircraft, constantly roaming the skies close to Cuban airspace.
Annual cost of $10 million and risk-taking aside, the U.S. airwave assault probably violates international broadcasting agreements because it interferes with frequencies used by Cuba. It’s not clear whether the Obama Administration has quietly parked the Bush plane in a hangar, but it’s still in the Marti budget.
Cuba isn’t the only one trying to bump the Martis off the air — there is static inside the United States. A bipartisan group of Congresspeople who believe that normalization is the best way to foster change in Cuba have picked Radio/TV Marti as the fall guy. After a series of scathing findings by Congressional investigators — ranging from inefficiency to corruption — the stations’ budget has begun to shrink; the only reason there still are a relatively lavish $32.5 million this financial year is the pull of a bipartisan group of Cuban American legislators.
So far, the Obama Administration has barely scratched the status quo. Part of the reason may be that the director position of the International Broadcasting Bureau has been vacant since 2005, when noted neo-conservative Seth Cropsey left the job. Under the “temporary” direction since October 2006 of Danforth W. Austin, who is both director of Voice of America and deputy director of the IBB, the administration has begun to consolidate some of the operations between the Spanish-language service of VOA and the Martis.
Long-time Cuba watcher and former New York Times reporter Ann-Louise Bardach speculates that this might be the controversial station’s “swan song.”
According to IBB statutes, the director is supposed to not only figure out “consolidation of broadcast services”, but to come up with “long-term strategies for the future of international broadcasting.” So Lobo has his work cut out; but if he wants to stir up things, he can bet his retirement that Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and friends will put him on the hot seat.
Reacting to VOA-Marti pooling, the Cuban-American Republican has already drawn a line in the sand. “I am looking into this issue to ensure that this is an effort to maximize resources to expand U.S. coverage in the region, and not a back door to reducing U.S. broadcasts to Cuba,” warned Miami Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen in an interview with AP.
Also, the five board members overseeing the IBB — ranging from Hillary Clinton to Miami media czar Joaquin Blaya — aren’t exactly stalwarts of change.
But then, it’s well possible Lobo himself isn’t inclined to fundamentally changing the Martis. After all, his DNA is all over the place — Lobo was in charge of the Cuba stations during the first Clinton Administration.
Lobo said he couldn’t comment on this story, pending his Senate confirmation.
Johannes Werner is editor of Cuba Standard and Cuba Trade & Investment News
