Radio Martí

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Radio Martí is a radio and television broadcaster based in Miami, Florida, financed by the United States government (Broadcasting Board of Governors), which transmits Spanish radio broadcasts to Cuba. Its broadcasts can also be heard in the United States.

1 History
2 Radio Martí today
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] History

Radio Martí was established in 1983 by President Ronald Reagan, at the urging of Jorge Mas Canosa, with the mission of fighting communism. Today, it broadcasts a 24-hour radio program on short and medium wave.

In the early 1980, the U.S. Government planned to create a radio station to be known as Radio Free Cuba, modeled on Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, with the hopes of contributing to the fall of Cuban president Fidel Castro. Existing North American broadcasters objected strenuously to these plans, fearing that they would lead Cuba to retaliate by jamming existing commercial medium-wave broadcasts from Florida. These fears were based in part on Cuba's occasional past interference with U.S. broadcasts, in attempts to prevent them from being received within Cuba.

Thus, on May 20, 1985, broadcasts to Cuba from the United States began. The first day of broadcasting was chosen to commemorate the anniversary of Cuba's independence from Spanish colonial rule, May 20, 1902. The station came to be named Radio Martí after Cuban writer José Martí, who had fought for Cuba's independence from Spain and against U.S. influence in Latin America.

In 1990, TV Marti was created to broadcast television programming to Cuba.

[edit] Radio Martí today

Today, Radio Marti transmits over shortwave transmitters in Delano, California and Greenville, North Carolina and a medium-wave transmitter in Florida. Cuba jams both the medium-wave and shortwave signals, but the shortwave program is heard throughout Central and South America. On occasion, the mediumwave transmitter at 1180 kHz can be heard as far north as Washington, D.C.

Radio Marti operates with about 100 employees and a budget of $15 million. Its mission, in its own words, is to provide "a contrast to Cuban media and provide its listeners with an uncensored view of current events." Former prisoners in Cuba and Cuban exiles often speak on Radio Marti; and on Saturdays a Spanish version of the U.S. president's weekly radio address, as well as the opposition's response, are transmitted.

There is much debate about the effectiveness of these broadcasts. As with Radio Free Europe during the Cold War, there is no way to judge the station's true audience through the usual listener surveys. Thus, the actual number of listeners is open to speculation. Even Cubans travelling abroad will report both that everyone listens, and that nobody listens.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, the budget for all U.S. government-run foreign broadcasters, with the exception of Radio Marti, was sharply reduced. In 1996, its studios were moved to Miami, Florida from Washington, DC. The move, in addition to placing the station's studios closer to its target audience, also underscored its growing independence from the Voice of America, another government-run foreign broadcaster with which Radio Martí had previously shared studios.