GENERAL ELECTIONS IN CUBA - The people came, saw, voted and conquered
www.granma.cu BY MIREYA CASTAÑEDA -Granma International staff writer-
PRESIDENT Fidel Castro spoke on the Cuban electoral system, increased popular interest in the general elections, the Revolution’s social programs and certain international issues after casting his vote at Electoral College No. 4, District 7, Santiago de Cuba.
The leader of the Revolution arrived at the constituency located at the Alejandro Urgellés sports complex on Avenida de las Américas in this eastern city of the island, at 10:00 a.m. on Sunday, January 19, the date convened for general elections for deputies to the National Assembly (609) and delegates to the Provincial Assemblies (1,100).
Fidel presented his documents at the electoral table and was given a green ballot (deputies) and a white one (delegates). He moved to the voting booth to exercise his constitutional right to a secret vote and deposited the ballots in the two boxes guarded by students.
A group of journalists from the national and international media were waiting at the college to ask the president questions, the first on his opinion of what is to be the new National Assembly.
Fidel replied that the new Parliament should be of higher quality than former ones, primarily because of the constant raising of the population’s educational level, and because the election system itself has been improved.
He recalled that the direct electoral system began in 1992 with the special period and observed how there is more experience today, such as greater contact between candidates and voters and the increased interest of the people in those who are to represent them.
In terms of representation, Fidel Castro reiterated that half of the deputies are nominated from the base (the other 50% by the social, student, trade union and campesino organizations) and all of them have to gain over half the valid votes cast to be elected.
In that context he explained some of the reasons for the united (block) vote, including a tendency to vote for known persons: distinguished scientists, intellectuals, professors or ministers as opposed to candidates from the base who are needed in the National Assembly.
He also referred to what he described as heartening data on the future composition of the National Assembly in terms of ethnic composition (32.96% black and mixed race), women (35.96%) and educational level (almost 98% university or senior high school graduates).
He commented on the positive aspect of more frequent visits by candidates in order to familiarize themselves with the people and their problems, and how there is a growing interest in the provincial municipalities to be well represented in a National Assembly that is gaining in prestige. “In any case,” he affirmed, “deputies represent the nation and all the people.
He noted that the data show a renovation in the nominations’ slate (where a lot of work has been done and also because new people have come forward); a certain reduction in the total of young people under 30 (16 years to be entitled to vote, but 18 to be nominated); and an increase in the 30-40 age group, which naturally has earned more merit.
The president responded to other questions on national issues, including the case of the five Cubans imprisoned in the United States and the recent article in The New York Times (to which Ricardo Alarcón, president of the Cuban Parliament, made an ample response a few days ago), published at this point to counteract active campaigning on their behalf.
He stressed that the trial of the Five, who are political prisoners, was shameful and rigged, and resulted in two life sentences. However the Five are providing an example of dignity, and the international press has not made any mention of that, he noted.
“On the other hand, that same press takes it upon itself to circulate anything on the so-called dissidents in Cuba, whom everybody knows are incubated in the U.S. Interest Section.”
Fidel observed that that institution has no weight, no influence on anything, because there is a political culture in Cuba and serious and hardworking people are not going to bother themselves with trivialities. “All those things are part of the empire’s useless attempts to destroy and divide us.”
In relation to events in Latin America (Brazil, Ecuador), the president was asked if he felt “less alone,” to which he replied that he had never felt alone, not even in a prison cell. “If you have confidence in your ideas, in what you are doing, you will never be alone, and I have seen the growth in the number of people who support us, both within and without,” he commented.
He reflected that changes in history are associated with objective factors and thus what is occurring in Latin America today is the fruit of crisis, of the unsustainable economic order.
Venezuela was another issue he was asked to comment on, particularly the fact that President Hugo Chávez has asked for Cuba’s inclusion in the Group of Friendship.
Fidel stated that it is a delicate issue, affirming that in principle he is against any outside interference, because persons arrive as friends and end up as proconsuls, because when outsiders get involved they turn into interveners.
He noted that the ideas of the Group of Friends of Venezuela arose to support the legitimate government, but has been transformed and is acting belligerently by recognizing and encouraging the fascists; one only has to analyze the composition of the group to draw those conclusions.
“The gentlemen from the North are going to use their instruments,” he added, “given that the Organization of American States has a dubious history, with its expulsion of Cuba, its failure to act when the Dominican Republic and Panama were invaded, or in Guatemala where 200,000 people disappeared.
“I imagine that many Venezuelans are concerned about this group,” he continued, “with people like Reich and Noriega heading Latin American Affairs in the Bush administration. And Spain, an unconditional U.S. ally. They prevented me from going to Mexico and various governments backed the coup against Chávez. Are those people going to mediate between a legitimate government and the fascists who organized the coup? Venezuela’s enemies are dominant within this group under the baton of the head of a unipolar world. It’s a plan, a maneuver, a project to destroy the Venezuelan process,” he emphasized.
Fidel affirmed: “Chávez is a friend, a very noble man with a great love for his people, a man educated in the thinking of Bolívar and Martí, respectful of the law, decisive and intelligent, “and if he asks us for something, he knows that he can count on our sympathy and support. However we would have to assess it carefully, because gestures can turn into intervention, and do away with the country’s sovereignty.”
BEFORE THE PEOPLE OF SANTIAGO
The people had gathered outside the Electoral College, acclaiming Fidel, and the president stopped. He began by paraphrasing the famous phrase ‘I came, I saw and I conquered.’ Fidel said: “I came, I saw and I voted,” and confirmed that the people could say exactly the same thing.
The president expressed his belief that in more than 30 years of the institutional process never before had elections been preceded by so much enthusiasm.
He explained how our revolutionary and socialist democracy has been steadily improved and that now the Cuban people know why they vote, not like before 1959, he recalled, when those with money were elected or won by fraudulent means. Then being a political agent was a profession. What kind of democracy was that?
He then asked how many of the people gathered there were political agents, or were given money to vote, or what kind of money the candidate had, how he was nominated and who elected the constituency delegates. “You have elected, all the citizens who wanted to stand for the Assembly were nominated and elected by you.”
“This little country 90 miles from the most powerful empire ever to have existed has never been defeated throughout 44 years,” Fidel noted, “because a Revolution is also a battle of ideas, and we used arms well when our land was invaded at the Bay of Pigs, or when they killed teachers, and nobody can make up stories about that,” he stressed, “because during the October Crisis I never saw any comrade vacillate, and nobody came to inspect us.
“We have been able to resist more than 30 years of blockade, more than 10 years of special period, when we were left without fuel, spare parts, and certain people believed that the Revolution wouldn’t last a week, or 24 hours. And 10 years have gone by and here is the Revolution, stronger than ever,” the president confirmed.
“Today the people are more aware and more united than ever, and are participating in the most just elections that could be found anywhere in the world,” he continued, “a people with absolute equality of rights.”
The leader of the revolution referred to the 100-plus social programs being developed on the island, to studies on malnutrition, mental backwardness, and physical malformation, to the profound educational revolution and the tremendous labors in the field of public health.
He outlined the number of medical faculties, family doctors, research into cancer, hospitals and affirmed: “These labors are for everyone, nobody is going to ask any U.S. Interest Section employee in pain anything, they will treat him or her and save his or her life; that is socialism, humanism.
Finally, President Fidel Castro expressed his optimism, his joy at what the country is today: a standard of justice, liberty, and a decorous level of education and living standards. “There is nothing we propose that we cannot obtain, that is what I am saying on this glorious, dignified and joyful day of our general elections.”