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News > Latin America

Cuba: Communist Party Ask for Citizens to Discuss Final Report

  • Cuban President Raul Castro addresses his party's first annual Congress in five years.

    Cuban President Raul Castro addresses his party's first annual Congress in five years. | Photo: Reuters

Published 17 April 2016
Opinion

President Raul Castro proposed that future Communist Party leaders should retire at 70 and play with their grandchildren.

Delegates to Cuba's 7th Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba underway in Havana proposed Sunday that their final report, which was presented during the opening session, be made public so all levels of Cuban society can discuss it, according to Radio Havana Cuba.

In the meantime, according to Reuters, President Raul Castro, 84, proposed that future top leaders of Cuba's Communist party should retire at 70 to make way for younger blood, while suggesting older members could play with their grandchildren instead.

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Ines Maria Chapman, a delegate from the northeastern province of Holguin, said the Congress' final report should be analyzed in party branches at grassroot levels and also by boards of directors of companies.

She explained that this would serve as a guide to identifying problems and finding solutions for them.

The Congress’ main report was presented during a plenary session on Saturday by Raul Castro, who is the Communist Party secretary.

The report offers a detailed and critical look at economic issues regarding the Cuban life of the last five years, while exposing the challenges the country faces in the future.

Cuban Five Fernando Gonzalez, who is an invited guest of the Congress along with his four U.S. prison companions, supported the proposal to have the text discussed nationally.

Cuba's current leaders include several septuagenarian or octogenarian veterans of Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution. There is a growing urgency for them to make succession plans to keep the party alive once they are gone.

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Raul Castro, who has announced plans to retire from government in two years, has hinted that Cuba is likely to be led by somebody with a different surname for the first time since his brother overthrew a pro-U.S. government nearly 60 years ago.

His comments during a two-hour speech at the inauguration of the Communist Party's twice-per-decade Congress were met with silence, perhaps because some members were disappointed with the idea.

"So serious! What silence is caused by this subject. Don't think that just because you can't be in the leadership of the country you can't do anything," Raul Castro said.

On Monday, the party is due to vote for a new leadership, and is expected to re-elect Castro and the party number two Jose Ramon Machado Ventura, 85. Presumably the new rules would not apply to them because they are already within the leadership.

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