Spanish journalist Vicente Botín has written a new biography on Army General and Cuban President Raúl Castro entitled, Raúl Castro: la pulga que cabalgó al tigre (Raúl Castro: The Flea that Rode the Tiger), which will be published later this week.
The title of the book is derived from the Chinese proverb: “He who rides a tiger can never get off or the tiger will devour him.”
In his book preview editorial in La Razón, Botin writes, “In the shadow of his brother Fidel, the political life of Raúl Castro has been dark and hard; he has been the executive arm of the maximum leader’s desires.”
Interesting tidbits from the editorial:
- GAESA (Grupo de Administración Empresarial, S.A.), the Cuban Armed Forces’ holding company (managed by Raúl’s son-in-law Luis Alberto López Calleja), controls almost 70% of the country’s economy through transient businesses that generate almost 90% of exports, 60% of tourism revenues, around 25% of services revenues, 60% of currency revenues and more than 65% of all minor commerce in currency exchanges. The volume of annual profits surpasses $1B;
- Raúl’s daughter Mariela Castro has taken the family’s monies out of the country with ease of travel as she is accompanied by her Italian husband, Paolo;
- Raúl Castro visited Italy (after Fidel fell ill in 2006) to deposit millions of pesos, affirms exiled Cuban General José Quevedo;
- Leninist machismo enjoys good health in Cuba as the perks of Raulistas within the military working in GAESA companies. They are a privileged class with higher incomes and a much higher standard of living not only to the civilian population but to their own comrades in arms serving a strictly military function in locations far away from the resorts.
[H/T: The Cuban Triangle]