Cuban Government

• Cuba will liberate 7 dissidents according to Spanish Foreign Minister.
• Equatorial Guinea’s President visits Cuba.
• Apathy and resignation weighs on “presidential” decision in Cuba.
• BBC Mundo correspondent in Havana launches blog. [H/T: Penultimos Dias]
• Cuba: The change that never comes. (In Spanish) [H/T: La Nueva Cuba]

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• Angola and Cuba sign a police cooperation accord.
• Nickel surpasses tourism in earnings for Cuba.
• Mexico’s ex-Foreign Minister Jorge Castañeda spied for Cuba.
• University students question Cuban government’s policies.
• Sugar production could grow post-Castro.

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Marc Frank of the Financial Times summarizes the current state of Cuba’s “electroral” politics and speculation on Fidel Castro’s future.

In an indication that it is not yet time to count Fidel Castro out of Cuban politics, the increasingly frail 81-year-old leader of the Cuban revolution will contest for a seat in the National Assembly in the parliamentary election this weekend.

The election - in which Cubans vote on candidates who have been selected by the ruling Communist party - kicks off a two-month process that will eventually lead to the selection of a president, vice-president and executive bodies for new five-year terms.

It is expected to clarify the future role of Mr Castro, who temporarily handed over his executive responsibilities to his younger brother Raúl after undergoing abdominal surgery 17 months ago.

Mr Castro, who has undergone at least three major operations and has only been seen in edited videos and pictures since July 2006, needs to win a seat if he is to continue playing a senior role in Cuba’s government. The assembly of 614 parliamentarians chooses a 31-member council of state, as well as a vice-president and president from among its own number.

Mr Castro recently contributed to speculation that he may be preparing to formally abandon posts. In a letter sent to a Cuban television programme at the end of last year, he said that “my primary duty is not to cling to any position, and even less to obstruct the rise of younger persons”.

But just days later, Raúl Castro appeared to suggest his older brother may still be able to play an important executive role. “Fidel has . . . full use of his mental faculties with some small physical limitations,” the country’s acting president said as he toured the electoral district in the eastern city of Santiago where Mr Castro is a candidate to become a deputy.

Raúl said his brother was consulted on major decisions and exercised two hours a day. “He has recovered quite a lot of weight and muscular mass . . . for this, all party delegates support him running again (for the national assembly),” he said.

Mr Castro’s convalescence and activities since he temporarily ceded power to Raúl have been shrouded in extraordinary secrecy.

“They are in guerrilla mode and anything is possible,” a western diplomat said. “Do not expect an answer to the retirement question until the last moment,” he added.

Even veteran Communist party members are uncertain what will happen. “I think Fidel will step down and continue to guide us from another position. We have gotten through these difficult moments remarkably well, why would we now go backward?” Yolanda Rodriguez, a former member of the national assembly, said.

Another veteran of the revolution’s early days, who does not want to be named, said Mr Castro would never be replaced as head of state as long as the United States demanded it.

Speculation as to who might replace Mr Castro centres on Raúl, 76, though there are some people who believe both Castros might step aside, with vice-president Carlos Lage, 56, who already functions much like a prime minister, the apparent favourite to assume the presidency or to become first vice-president behind Raúl.

Even if Mr Castro does step down as president, few believe he’ll go off and meditate in the mountains. “Will he really be announcing his retirement? Of course not,” says Domingo Amuchastegui, a former Cuban intelligence officer who defected in the 1990s and now lives in Florida.

He said: “Any serious approach to his personality confirms that he is a man ready to die with his boots on, until the limits of his physical and intellectual abilities.”

Other analysts suggest even a formal relinquishing of power will be a watershed in Cuba history.

“For the first time in 50 years, Cuba would have a new head of state,” said Julia Sweig, director of Latin America studies at the Washington-based Council on Foreign Relations.

She said: “It would signal in Cuba a new era might be dawning and be huge news in Washington. Until the real funeral it will be as close as we will come to an opportunity to move the policy debate forward.”

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O Estado De S.Paulo reports Brazil’s President Lula da Silva will offer Cuba $1 billion dollars in credits to finance the purchase of aliments, housing construction, and exploration of nickel as well as other projects, affirm Brazilian diplomats. 

[Photo: Reuters — Cuban interim-President Raul Castro and Brazilian President Lula da Silva review FAR Honor Guards.]

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Brian Latell’s latest assessment of the Cuban transition is published in today’s Wall Street  Journal:

 Without a hint of irony, Fidel Castro asserted twice last month in columns in Cuba’s Granma newspaper, that he is not one “to cling to power.” The truth is that few world leaders in modern times have ruled as long as he has. On New Year’s Day he began the 50th year of his dictatorship.

But now, at the age of 81, handicapped and incapable of providing coherent leadership, the end of his historic reign is imminent. He has not been seen in public for more than 17 months after ceding authority “provisionally” to his brother Raúl, Cuba’s defense minister.

During his incapacitation there have been no reports of Communist Party officials seeking his counsel, carrying out his directives, or even taking initiatives in his name. When pressed to comment on Fidel’s condition and role in the leadership, Cuban officials lately have been saying mainly that he continues to inspire them and provide ideas.

So it seems all but certain that, voluntarily or not, he’ll vacate the Cuban presidency early this year, though he may symbolically hold onto some new, wholly honorific title.

The transition at the top will probably set in motion cascading reassignments of civilian and military officials. Raúl Castro will call the shots, but mostly from behind the scenes. With his own bases of support in the armed forces that he has run since 1959, the security services he has controlled since 1989, and the Communist Party he manages, he has the power and legitimacy to preside over the succession. He has been the designated heir since January 1959. And at the age of 76, with many years of hard drinking under his belt, he is probably viewed by most in the leadership as a transitional figure, better to be courted than challenged.

Raúl’s style guarantees that Cuba will be governed differently. He’ll rule more collegially than his brother, consulting trusted subordinates and delegating more. During the interregnum he has worked with officials of different generations and pedigrees, even promoting one long-time archrival to create a united front after his brother’s initial withdrawal.

On his watch, Raúl has broken some previously sacred crockery as well. He has admitted that Cuba’s many problems are systemic. In his disarmingly accurate view, it is not the American embargo or “imperialism” that are the cause of problems on the island, as his brother always insisted, but rather the regime’s own mistakes and mindsets. He has called on Cubans, especially the youth, to “debate fearlessly” and help devise solutions for the failures. Candid discussions at the grassroots level have proliferated.

Yet like his brother, Raúl has no intention of opening Cuba to free political speech or participation. While the number of Cubans willing to voice their discontent publicly is on the increase, so too is the brutality of government reprisals against would-be leaders of the dissident movement. By acknowledging state failures, Raúl is playing with fire, and if the lid is going to be kept on, those challenging the regime have to pay a price. As to his own future, in the leadership realignments he plans, he will probably move up one rank and assume command of the Communist Party as first secretary.

In an address last July dedicated primarily to massive failures in agriculture, Raúl called for “structural and conceptual” change. Given his past sympathetic references to the laws of supply and demand, his advocacy of liberalizing economic reforms in the 1990s, and the many for-profit enterprises his military officers have been encouraged to run, he probably plans to introduce market incentives in the countryside. That might prove the first step toward adopting something akin to the Chinese or Vietnamese economic development models.

It has been Raúl’s preference since the earliest days of his partnership with Fidel to work inconspicuously in the background. As they have been doing since Fidel’s confinement, others will represent Cuba abroad and preside at holiday events. Someone who is not named Castro will likely become Cuba’s next president. There has never been a “third man” in the running for leadership. But legitimizing the longer-term succession is surely now one of Raúl’s highest priorities. Politburo member and Vice President Carlos Lage is the leading candidate. A medical doctor 20 years younger than Raúl, Mr. Lage is widely considered an advocate of economic reform.

After nearly a half century of Fidel’s suffocating control, the transition will be daunting. His successors are inheriting a bankrupt and broken system, a profoundly disgruntled populace, and acute economic problems. The worst of these are the dysfunctional public transportation and agricultural sectors, a housing shortage, decrepit infrastructure, unemployment and the widening gap in living standards between Cubans with access to hard currency and the more numerous poor who must subsist on worthless pesos.

And there is Hugo Chávez. Unlike Fidel, Raúl has no personal rapport with the mercurial Venezuelan president, and surely no desire to be subordinated to another narcissistic potentate just as he is finally close to escaping his brother’s grip. But Cuba has become highly dependent economically on Venezuela. The value of the Chávez dole, mostly oil, reached between $3 billion and $4 billion last year, approaching the amounts once provided by the Soviet Union. Raúl would be loath to provoke the Venezuelan. Without his support, the Cuban economy would soon plunge into deep recession.

There is no way to know how skillfully Raúl Castro will lead and deal with inevitable crises once his brother is gone. He clearly wants to begin rectifying economic problems but knows that, for some time at least, he cannot broadly repudiate his brother’s legacy. A powerful backlash could come from fidelista hard-liners in the leadership — and perhaps from Mr. Chávez. In the end, however, it is the gamble Raúl will have to take.

Mr. Latell served as national intelligence officer for Latin America from 1990-1994 and is author of “After Fidel,” (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005).

[Graphic: Wall Street Journal]

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Spain’s National Intelligence Center believes Fidel Castro will be cast aside from power on March 5 when the new National Assembly is convened in which Army General Raul Castro will be given power, according to Diario Critico.

What will happen now? For the Spanish intelligence services there is no doubt: Fidel Castro will definitively leave power, which will open the door to a political transition on the island — slowly, but assured.

Cuban sources sustain, because of health reasons, Fidel Castro will leave effectively the Presidency of the Council of State, however, he will not leave being unrepresented in the power structure.

Three theories are afloat in this regard:

1. He will be separated from power but will remain as a type of non-executive counsel to the regime;
2. He will remaintain the rank of the Presidency of Council of State but with an executive character — a solution that will avoid future judicial problems, or
3. The creation of an Honorary Presidency

(H/T: La Nueva Cuba)

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Diario Granma (Cuban Communist Party’s official newspaper) published an article last Friday concerning the generational shift, as per the Cuban Government’s view, in the parliamentary body (National Assembly of the People’s Power) wherein the Communist Party is the only political actor designated to participate in the upcoming January 20th parliamentary election.

Interesting statistics of note:

• Of the 614 candidates for the parliament, 374 (60.91 percent) were born after the triumph of the revolution in 1959. Another 134 (21.82 percent) were under the age of ten. Only 106 candidates (17.25 percent) knew capitalism in Cuba, that is to say, those who were part of the generation that defeated the Batista dictatorship and began building socialism.

• In terms of continuity and renewal, 36.78 percent of the candidates (224) are incumbents in the current 609 member legislature. Therefore, a little over 63.22 percent (385 legislators) will be newcomers in the new legislature of 614 members with the additional 5 members reflecting population growth.

• 42.16 percent of the candidates (265) are women and a majority (481) of the candidates have a university level education (78.34 percent) and 127 (20.68) with high school and/or technical degrees.

Delegates of the Municipal Assemblies of Santiago de Cuba and Segundo Frente approved on December 3 the candidacy of Maximum Fidel Castro, Army General Raúl Castro and Commander of the Revolution Juan Almeida as candidates to the Cuban National Parliament.

On December 27, Fidel Castro sent a message to the National Assembly signaling a possible relinquishment of power.  In his letter, he stated:

“What the international press has emphasized most in its reports on Cuba in recent days is the statement I made on the 17th of this month, in a letter to the director of Cuban television’s Round Table program, where I said that I am not clinging to power. I could add that for some time I did, due to my youth and lack of awareness, when, without any guidance, I started to leave my political ignorance behind and became a utopian socialist. It was a stage in my life when I believed I knew what had to be done and wanted to be in a position to do it! What made me change? Life did, delving more deeply into Martí’s ideas and those of the classics of socialism. The more deeply I became involved in the struggle, the stronger was my identification with those aims and, well before the revolutionary victory I was already convinced that it was my duty to fight for these aims or to die in combat.”

As the Maximum Leader’s designated successor, Army General Raul Castro might be elected to succeed Fidel Castro as President of the Council of State and  Council of Minister, however, Fidel may assume the symbolic post of titular head of government.

One political figure whose ascendancy is evident is Carlos Lage.  Will his ascendancy bring the technocrats to shared power with the prevalent political force: the military?

It remains to be seen, but if change is not in the horizon ,vis-à-vis a political and economic aperture, then what looms for the status quo regime is instability and a serious threat to its sustained power.

(H/T: Cuaderno de Cuba)

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The Cuban Government’s infamous Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR) is being utilized by Army General Raul Castro to shore up his authority over the country, according to an extensive article from the Washington Post. Castro will employ anew this political tool of control that has served well the regime.

As per the article:

Cuba’s block committees were born in 1960, shortly after Fidel Castro’s revolutionary forces toppled the corrupt, U.S.-friendly government of Fulgencio Batista. Concerned about a U.S. invasion, Castro’s government adopted a motto, still present on Cuban billboards: “In a fortress under siege, all dissent is treason.”

The concept behind the CDRs was to create a citizen force that would reinforce the dictates of Cuba’s government, establishing a kind of omnipresent peer pressure network among next-door neighbors. Leaders of CDRs could put Castro’s every public thought directly and rapidly into the hands of every Cuban, so the government would not have to rely solely on mass media.

As Castro’s brother, interim President Raul Castro, prepares to take full control after his brother’s death, party officials take visiting dignitaries on tours of the committees, and there are signs that the younger Castro is trying to inject new life into a system that could be crucial to solidifying his hold on power.

Police call block leaders more often, pressing aggressively for information, according to interviews with current and former CDR leaders. Earlier this year, Cuba’s state-run television network broadcast an exposé shaming several committees for failing to post obligatory round-the-clock sentries.

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