Category — Council of State

Cuban generals in line.

Mexico’s La Journada has an article on the ascent of Cuban military generals who honed their careers with the triumph of the revolution and have made their way into the echelons of power in Cuba under Raul Castro’s government.

The designation of Army Corps General Leopoldo Cintra Frías as the new number two of the Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR), consolidates the ascension of the first line of command in Cuba under an experienced military generation of sexagenarians, maturing as young recruits in the revolution at the end of the 1950’s, active in domestic defense in the 1960’s, alumnus of the Soviets in the 1970’s, and victorious chiefs in Central and Southern Africa in the 1980’s.

[H/T: Penultimos Dias]

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Foreign Policy magazine has published a list of The World’s 10 Oldest Leaders which includes Cuba’s own Raul Castro:

Raúl Castro

Date of birth: June 3, 1931

Years in power: 2 (president since February 2008, but had been de facto president since July 2006 when his brother, Fidel Castro, transferred power to him due to failing health)

Rank on Failed States Index: No. 77, “borderline”

Progeny: 3 daughters and 1 son; 8 grandchildren, according to a June 2007 New York Times obituary about Raúl’s wife

Health status: Raúl is addicted to alcohol and has been a heavy drinker since his teenage years, according to research by Brian Latell, an expert on Cuba at the University of Miami.

Next in line: Some names floated after Fidel stepped down from power include Carlos Lage, Ricardo Alarcón, Felipe Pérez Roque, Ramiro Valdés, and Esteban Lazo, all of whom have held high-level government positions.

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State media declares:

Raúl Castro (President, Council of State)  has signed two new decree laws on the distribution in usufruct of idle land, and on working conditions and wages for retired teachers and professors who return to the classrooms.

• Decree-Law No. 259 authorizes the handing over in usufruct of idle state land to individuals and legal entities for using in a rational and sustainable form, in line with the land’s suitability for agricultural production. It adds that the usufruct granted is for a period of up to 10 years in the case of individuals and up to 25 years in the case of legal entities. It notes that the maximum amount of land to be distributed to individuals without any land is 13.42 hectares and, in the case of those holding land as their own property or in usufruct, they can increase it up to 40.26 hectares.

• Decree-Law No. 260 authorizes retired teachers and professors with the capacity to contribute their professionalism and experience, to receive, on a provisional and exceptional basis, the full salary of any teaching job they may fill, plus their pension. It is explained that this decree has been expedited for convenience until the new Social Security bill is approved. The current Social Security Act establishes that retirees can participate in paid work on the condition that the total of their new salary and their pension does not exceed the salary they received prior to receiving their pension.

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Cuban media reports Army General Raul Castro presided over a joint meeting of the Politburo and Council of State.  The economic and social situation of the country were analyzed.  Food production and rise in the main branches of productive activity and services were among other topics of discussion.

Also debated were some issues to be discussed at today’s session of the National Assembly (Cuban Parliament).

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Political structure
May 6th 2008
From the Economist Intelligence Unit
Source: Country Report

Official name

Republic of Cuba

Form of government

Centralised political system, with close identification between the PCC and the state

Head of state

The president, Raul Castro, took over from his brother, Fidel, on February 24th 2008

The executive

The Council of Ministers is the highest executive body; its Executive Committee is composed of the president, the first vice-president and the vice-presidents of the Council of Ministers

National legislature

National Assembly of People’s Power; 614 members elected by direct ballot; the Assembly meets twice a year, and extraordinary sessions can be called

Legal system

A People’s Supreme Court oversees a system of regional tribunals; the Supreme Court is accountable to the National Assembly

National elections

Provincial and national assemblies: last elections January 20th 2008; next elections due in January 2012. Municipal elections: last held October 2007; next due in April 2010

National government

The organs of the state and the PCC are closely entwined, and power devolves principally from the Executive Committee of the Council of Ministers

Main political organisation

The Partido Comunista de Cuba (PCC) is the only legal political party

President of the councils of state & ministers: Raul Castro Ruz

First vice-president: Jose Ramon Machado Ventura

Vice-president: Carlos Lage Davila

President of the National Assembly: Ricardo Alarcon de Quesada

Key ministers

Agriculture: Maria del Carmen Perez

Armed forces: General Julio Casas Regueiro

Audit & control: Gladys Maria Bejerano Portela

Basic industry: Yadira Garcia Vera

Communications & informatics: Ramiro Valdes Menendez

Culture: Abel Prieto Jimenez

Economy & planning: Jose Luis Rodriguez Garcia

Education: Ana Elsa Velazquez

Finance & prices: Georgina Barreiro Fajardo

Foreign investment & economic co-operation: Marta Lomas Morales

Foreign relations: Felipe Perez Roque

Foreign trade: Raul de la Nuez Ramirez

Government: Ricardo Cabrisas Ruiz

Justice: Maria Esther Reus Gonzalez

Labour & social security: Alfredo Morales Cartaya

Light industry: Estela Dominguez Ariosa

Public health: Jose Ramon Balaguer

Science, technology & the environment: Fernando Gonzalez Bermudez

Sugar: Ulises Rosales del Toro

Tourism: Manuel Marrero Cruz

Transport: Jorge Luis Sierra Cruz

Central Bank president

Francisco Soberon Valdes

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Americas Quarterly published by the Americas Society offers a preview of its Spring edition, and presents summaries of two articles on Cuba.

Cuba No Libre by Gary Marx and Cecilia Vaisman

On February 19th, Fidel Castro made it official: he was resigning the presidency and ending his 50-year reign over Cuba. Many exiles, U.S. officials and Cubans on the island had been waiting for this historic day, confident that it would not only mark a new beginning but signal that fundamental change was coming to the hemisphere’s only communist nation. Some experts predicted that Cubans, fed up with shortages and hardship, would rise up and demand freedom. Others suggested change would come from within the government—that a younger generation of leaders would ascend to the top and recognize that Cuba’s economic and political system was bankrupt and needed radical reform.

But what happened following Fidel’s announcement was the opposite. Rather than taking to the streets demanding change, Cubans are going about their daily lives—queuing for hours at bus stops, collecting monthly food rations at neighborhood bodegas, and showing up at government jobs—as if nothing unusual has happened. Rather than a new generation of leaders taking over, Raúl Castro, Fidel’s younger brother, was named Cuba’s new president, and a cadre of aging communist loyalists continue to dominate the leadership structure in the newly named Council of State, the nation’s top policy-making body.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice once again urged the Cuban…

Frustration Mounts by Orlando Gutierrez-Boronat

If the new Cuban government has a remarkable resemblance to the old, that’s because they are one and the same. No real change has taken place in Cuba. Yet. The same group that accompanied Fidel and Raúl Castro since their days in the Sierra Maestra—all now senior citizens—remains firmly at the helm of government. They represent the quintessence of the Cuban military-industrial complex. Below them, however, lies an entity often observed but not very well understood: the Cuban people.

Recent polls by Gallup (2006) and the International Republican Institute (2007) indicate that a majority of Cubans are unhappy with their level of personal and economic freedom. Cubans increasingly cry out for greater personal autonomy, and that also includes questioning of the political structure. That unhappiness has largely been expressed in a withdrawal from the political involvement that has been crucial to the government’s ability to keep the population in check. According to the government’s own figures, over 1.4 million Cubans did not participate in the one-party, single-candidate electoral process that culminated with the selection of Raúl Castro as president this year. That’s a noteworthy decline from the 823,171 who absented themselves from the previous “elections” held in 2003. Considering that the Cuban government uses a wide array of persuasive and coercive measures to pressure citizens to participate, it is a highly significant figure.

But passive discontent is already changing into a more active mode…

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