Cuba poll: Obama tops Castro in popularity

People hope for better times with U.S.

Cubans are overwhelmingly optimistic about the hope of economic change from President Obama’s decision to re-establish diplomatic ties with the island country, according to a survey its authors describe as the first independent poll there in decades.

Of those canvassed, 73% said they are optimistic about their future. All but 3% said normalizing relations between the United States and Cuba is good for their country of 11 million and could improve basic standards of living.

Obama is among the island’s most popular people: He has a positive rating of 80%, equaling that of Pope Francis and nearly doubling the 44% for former Cuban leader Fidel Castro.

Cuba’s economy is ailing after 50 years under a U.S. trade em- bargo, so most Cubans worry more about money than politics, the survey shows. Nearly half said improving the economy is key.

Despite high ratings for Cuba’s free health care and educational systems, 55% said they would live elsewhere if they could.

Only 24% said an open political system is uppermost for them, and more than half doubt that normal relations with the United States will change the system.

The results released Wednesday were from door-to-door surveys of 1,200 Cubans by public relations research firm Bendixen & Amandi International for Univision in collaboration with The Washington Post. The survey was done without the Cuban government being informed, co-author Fernand Amandi said.

The findings could surprise many in the USA, said Maria Cristina Garcia, a history professor at Cornell University who has studied Cuban migration. “Cuba is a mystery to so many Americans,” she said.