The U.S. Agency for International Development's controversial "Cuban Twitter" initiative tried to shift its social media program into the hands of Roots of Hope, a nonprofit organization for young Cuban-Americans, according to a new report from The Associated Press. While Roots of Hope rejected the shift, some board members from the organization have been found connected to USAID's project.

The "Cuban Twitter" initiative — called ZunZuneo, slang for the sound a Cuban hummingbird makes — has recently been scrutinized by Congress after AP's original exposé revealed that USAID's secret Twitter-like program, if successful, might have been used to organize opposition to "renegotiate the balance of power between the state and society" in Cuba. As we mentioned, AP made the Cuban Twitter initiative sound like a Cold War-era anti-Castro CIA program, which USAID has subsequently defended as non-political in nature, kept discrete for practical reasons, and misreported by AP.

But covertly political or not, The Associated Press has enmeshed leaders of the popular Cuban-American nonprofit Roots of Hope into the controversy with its latest report.

According to AP, at least two people on the board of directors for Roots of Hope "went on to work as consultants," for ZunZuneo, "even as they served in an organization that explicitly refused to accept any U.S. government funds and distanced itself from groups that did." Roots of Hope is a nonprofit organization working to empower Cuban youth by bridging the gap between Cuban-Americans and youth in Cuba and raising awareness about the situation on that hermetic island.

The AP said that after USAID lost its grant for the text-messaging initiative ZunZuneo, the agency tried to find nongovernmental "private hands" to shift the program to, including the organization Roots of Hope. While the nonprofit group "dropped the idea" and never entered into any contracts or grants with USAID related to ZunZuneo, documents obtained by AP show some members of the organization's leadership's "extensive involvement at times."

For example, AP said documents show Roots of Hope co-Founder and former executive director Felice Gorordo had helped arrange meetings between ZunZuneo contractors and possible private investors, and two other Roots of Hope members, Chris Gueits and Raul Moas, worked for Mobile Accord — one of the project's contractors. Moas was mentioned in several internal emails and memos, including one that described him as "a fantastic addition to the team."

Neither Moas nor Gueits responded to the AP's request for comments, but Gorordo confirmed in an interview that he'd been asked to help identify possible donors but was not aware "there was an agenda" behind the ZunZuneo Program. "Personally I thought it had merit. It wasn't political," Gorordo said to the AP. "It had the goal of shared information. But it was not viable because it was a government project, and we do not accept U.S. government funding."

Roots of Hope does work to help Cubans connect with each other and the outside world, recently holding a "Hackathon for Cuba" to discuss the biggest issues facing the island nation and its people with respect to the internet, including connectivity, government censorship, limited access and low wireless penetration rates, as we previously reported. Roots of Hope did not respond to Latin Post's or AP's request for comment.

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