Voices: Opening a window into Cuba

My flight was booked, the Airbnb room in Havana was reserved, and my itinerary was set for a one-week reporting trip to Cuba.

Then I got the call: My journalism visa had been denied by Cuban authorities. Trip cancelled.

For a U.S. journalist, any restriction on reporting is immediate cause for concern. I was headed to Havana to cover the VII Congress of the Cuban Communist Party, where party leaders meet every five years (or so) to discuss the communist island’s future. The gathering of Cuba’s biggest political figures, which ends Tuesday, historically has been closed to the foreign press. But given President Obama’s recent historic visit to the island and the warming relations between Washington and Havana, I thought things might be different.

Also, we're in an unprecedented era of foreign press coverage of Cuba. More media organizations than ever before seemingly have been given access to the island ever since Obama and Cuban President Raúl Castro announced renewed ties in December 2014. Before then, foreign journalists, particularly those from the U.S., were largely restricted from reporting from Cuba.

Future path in question as Cuba's congress meets

A clear sign that Cuba has loosened those restrictions is the fact that the Miami Herald, for decades a perceived enemy of Cuba for its anti-Castro editorials, has recently gotten its reporters on the island repeatedly after a longtime ban.

I moderated a panel discussion earlier this month at the Hispanicize conference in Miami titled “Covering Cuba,” where each panelist, all veterans of Cuba reporting, spoke of the startling access they’ve had to the communist island since the two nations began their rapprochement.

One of the panelists was Mimi Whitefield, the Herald’s Cuba correspondent, who has covered the Caribbean island for more than two decades. She has been on multiple reporting trips to Cuba trips since the 2014 announcement, snapping a 17-year drought on visas.

“For anyone who follows Cuba, their world changed on Dec. 17, 2014,” she said at the panel discussion.

I traveled to the island three times last year, and my colleague, Alan Gomez, has been there more often. Obama’s recent trip drew hundreds of accredited journalists to Cuba.

On the island, there also has been a small explosion of independent media, fueled by online technology and tolerated by the governing regime. Sites such as OnCuba, Periodismo del Barrio and 14ymedio post illuminating articles about Cuban life and government, some  critical of official actions — unthinkable enterprises a decade ago.

There are also Catholic news sites, culture and entertainment ezines and the famed paquetes, or curated news stories and movies passed around on thumb drives, Ted Henken, a Baruch College Latino studies professor and Cuba scholar, told me. Cubans who missed Obama’s Havana speech when it was broadcast live on state TV last month could later see it on one of the paquetes, says Henken, who was in Havana for Obama's visit.

“It’s a whole world that’s expanding,” he says of the spread of new media on the island.

Voices: 17 years later, a very different Cuba

So why my rejection?

For starters, as mentioned, Cuba has traditionally closed off the congresses to outside press. Obama’s trip — with his calls for openness and tolerance from Cuba’s leaders — wasn’t about to change that.

The U.S. president’s visit, actually, may have forced some factions of the Cuban government to harden their stances, lest they appear to be acceding to U.S. wishes. Henken calls it the “Obama effect.”

“They may make reforms, but they certainly don’t want to be doing it in any way as a concession to Obama,” he says. “That’s their cardinal rule.”

Obama and Castro call for end of Cuba embargo

In his speech, Obama urged the Cuban people to control their destiny and Cuba’s leaders, specifically Raúl Castro, to be more open and tolerant to opposing views among his citizenry.

He also stressed the stark differences between the two countries and the need for each side to respect those differences. The more interaction between the two nations, according to Obama, the more those differences start to diminish.

It’d be great to get into the congress and openly report on the important decisions made by Cuba’s leaders that could forge the future of the island. But for now, chalk it up as another difference between the two countries that could, in time, slowly, steadily diminish.

Jervis is USA TODAY's Austin-based correspondent.