POLITICS-CUBA:
Fidel Re-Elected to
Parliament - Will He
Become President?
By Dalia Acosta
HAVANA, (IPS) - In
national elections for
the Cuban parliament’s
next five-year term, all
nominated candidates
were elected, including
President Fidel Castro,
who has been away from
government duties since
Jul. 31, 2006 for health
reasons.
"The 614 parliamentary
candidates [for the
National Assembly of
Popular Power] and the
1,201 delegates to the
provincial assemblies"
were elected, the
president of the
National Electoral
Commission, María Esther
Reus, confirmed
following Sunday’s
polls, without
mentioning any
particular individuals’
names.
Reus, who is also
Justice Minister, said
at the first press
conference to be held
after voting closed on
Sunday that, according
to the preliminary
figures, 8,230,832
people exercised their
right to vote. The
electoral register,
which was being updated
until the last minute,
listed 8,687,229
electors.
If the preliminary
figures are confirmed,
94.74 percent of those
eligible voted. On
examination, 95.24
percent of the votes for
parliament were valid,
3.73 percent were blank
votes and just over one
percent were annulled.
The existence of blank
and spoiled ballots was
seen by Reus as evidence
of democracy. "Our
electors have the
freedom and the
opportunity to exercise
their legal right to
vote in whatever way
they wish," the minister
said.
A block vote for all the
candidates, encouraged
by the authorities as a
gesture of support for
the Cuban revolutionary
process, was chosen by
91 percent of voters,
slightly more than the
90.88 percent who took
this option in the 2003
elections.
"I made use of the block
vote as a matter of
conscience," said Castro
on Sunday in a message
sent to the state
television channel.
"The block vote shows
that the Cuban elections
are a plebiscite. They
are a vote for or
against the Revolution,"
Manuel Cuesta Morúa,
spokesman for the
moderate opposition
coalition Arco
Progresista, told IPS.
The National Assembly
will convene on Feb. 24
to elect the 31-member
Council of State --
which during
parliamentary recesses
takes over as the
highest authority in the
country -- as well as
the Cuban president, the
first vice president,
five further vice
presidents and a
secretary. The president
is elected by secret
ballot.
In the view of local
analysts, after several
months of uncertainty,
the indications are that
Castro will again be
designated president of
the Council of State, a
post he has held since
the current
institutional model was
implemented in 1976,
while the current Acting
President, his brother
Raúl Castro, will be
re-elected first vice
president.
However, popular opinion
remains divided. A
42-year-old engineer
told IPS that "this
would be the right
moment to hand over to
the people who are
really governing. It
doesn’t make sense for
Fidel to stay on, and
for us to carry on in
this strange situation
we’ve experienced for
more than a year, in
which he is there and
yet he is not there,"
she said.
A video only two minutes
long, shown on national
television last
Wednesday, showed the
81-year-old Fidel Castro
visibly recovered, in
the best state of health
that he has enjoyed
since he was first
subjected to a series of
operations for an
intestinal disorder in
2006.
Even so, Castro admitted
on the same day that his
health was still a
limitation. "I do not
have the physical
capability to go out and
speak directly to the
residents of the
district which nominated
me for Sunday’s
elections. I do what I
can: I write," he said
in a column he has been
contributing regularly
to the national press.
Nevertheless, having
Fidel Castro at the head
of the Cuban state
appears to be seen by
the government as
important to guarantee
continuity at a time
when the country faces
big changes, requested
by a large proportion of
its 11.2 million people.
A package of measures,
mostly economic, may be
expected in March or
April, an economist at a
government institution
told IPS. "People have
been waiting for
measures of this kind,
but nothing was going to
happen before the
elections," he said.
The new parliament must
face "complex times" and
take "great decisions,"
Acting President and
Armed Forces Minister
Raúl Castro told the
press shortly after he
voted on Sunday.
According to information
from the National
Electoral Commission,
63.29 percent of the
members of the National
Assembly were replaced
in this election. Women
occupy 43.16 percent of
the seats, and the
average age of members
of parliament is 49.
Twenty-eight percent of
its members are workers
and small farmers, and
99.2 percent have
completed secondary or
higher education.
"This seventh
legislative period
beginning on Feb. 24
must face the new
challenges arising, in
the first place, from
the present reality in
Cuba, and also from the
new political scenario
in Latin America,"
Reverend Raúl Suárez,
one of the 224 members
of parliament who were
re-elected for another
term, told IPS.
"From my political point
of view, and I’m not an
expert in politics, I
think all the
institutions of People’s
Power should boost
popular participation,"
said Suárez, a Baptist
pastor, and since 1987
the head of the Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr.
Memorial Centre, who was
also elected to
parliament in 1993, 1998
and 2003.
Suárez said that he has
tried to show that "a
believer can participate
actively in politics in
the context of a
socialist project,
without laying aside his
or her faith or pastoral
vocation."
"As part of civil
society, I think that
our participation is
vital. We, too, are the
people, and as such we
belong indissolubly to
the whole of the people.
The people already know
our voice, it isn’t
alien to them. And our
voice speaks its own
language. It is
authentic, and not an
echo," he said.
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