"Problems with adherence to traditional journalistic standards, miniscule audience size, Cuban government jamming, and allegations of cronyism have dogged the program since its creation,'" recognized the committee, headed by Democrat John Kerry.
"The committee recommends urgently removing both stations from Miami, (and it) highlights the need to hire personnel in a more balanced way to produce a depoliticized and professional product."
In the report, Kerry makes reference to Alberto Mascarà ³, the nephew of Pedro Roig's wife - Roig was hired as the director of VOA Latin America thanks to his relative.
The document reports in detail how, in February 2007, Mascaro, "along with a relative of a member of Congress" (who was not named), pleaded guilty in the Federal Court to receiving $112,000 in illegal kickbacks from an OCB contractor. The former OCB employee was sentenced to 27 months in jail and fined $5,000 after being found guilty for taking as much as 50% of all monies paid by TV Martà for the production of television programming by Vendor Perfect Image.
And recently an article by professors Paul Drain and Michele Barry at StanfordUniversity (California), translated on the Rebelià ³n website, states:
"The US blockade on Cuba proclaimed after Fidel Castro's revolution ousted Batista's regime is 50 years old this 2010. Its stated objective has been to help the Cuban people to attain democracy but a U.S. Senate report from 2009 concluded that the unilateral blockade on Cuba has failed.
"Despite the blockade, Cuba has achieved better healthcare results than most Latin American countries and comparable with those of most of the developed nations. Cuba's average life expectancy is the highest (78.6 years) and it also has the highest density of medical doctors per capita 59 doctors to 10,000 people and the lowest mortality rate for children under one year of age (5.0 per 1,000 life births) and infant mortality (7.0 per 1,000 live births) among the 33 countries of Latin America and the Caribbean.
"In 2006, the Cuban government allocated about $355 per capita for healthcare.
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