Category: EFE

Selection Begins for Cuban Assembly Candidates Who Will Vote for Raul Castro’s Successor

Raúl Castro being appluaded in the National Assembly, in Havana. To the right, Cuban first vice-president Miguel Diaz-Canal. (EFE)

14ymedio biggerEFE (via 14ymedio), Havna, 5 January 2018 — The process to designate the candidates for the deputy positions that will make up the new National Assembly of People’s Power in Cuba, as well as the provincial Assemblies, began this Friday with consultations to the 12,515 municipal delegates selected in the elections on November 26.

The new Parliament will be the one that votes in April on the proposal of a new president to replace the current president, Raul Castro, 86, who will retire after two terms. However, before this happens provincial and general elections must be held, the dates for which have not yet been announced.

Between this Friday and January 14, the municipal delegates will be consulted on the proposals for “pre-candidates” to provincial delegate and deputy seats for their respective territories; some lists have been prepared by the provincial and national candidates commissions, according to a note from the state-owned Cuban News Agency (ACN). continue reading

There are 12,640 potential candidates on the lists who were, in turn, selected at meetings of the country’s mass organizations, all of whom are pro-government.

The Cuban Electoral Law establishes that up to 50% of the national deputies can be elected from among the municipal and provincial delegates, while the rest are proposed by social organizations.

“Personalities, outstanding workers, housewives, peasants, leaders and members of the armed institutions” are some of the profiles that these organizations can choose, says the ACN.

Once the regional and general elections are held, the new National Assembly will be formed, which in turn will propose and vote for the main government positions of the country, including the president and vice-president.

The start date of the new legislature was scheduled for February 24, but last December the Assembly, in response to a proposal from the State Council, approved extending the current mandate by two months due to the ravages caused in September by Hurricane Irma, which resulted in 13 billion dollars in loses in Cuba.

The new Parliament will be formed on April 19 and will be in charge of electing the country’s new president, an appointment that is the source of great anticipation because for the first time in six decades the ruler of the island will not carry the surname Castro.

“When the National Assembly is constituted I will have finished my second and last term at the head of the State and the Government, and Cuba will have a new president,” said Raul Castro before the National Assembly last December, in the year’s last plenary session.

Although there has been no official confirmation, it is expected that it will be the current first vice-president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, 57, who will relieve the younger Castro and occupy the presidency.

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Meliá Reopens Hotels In Varadero Northern Cuban Keys After Hurricane Irma

The Meliá Jardines del Rey will repoen November 1st, the Meliá Cayo Coco will open on the 4th, and the Sol Cayo Guillermo on the 15th. (Meliacuba)

14ymedio biggerEFE/14ymedio, Havana, 11 October 2017 — The Spanish group Meliá announced Wednesday that it will reopen eleven hotels in Cuba beginning on October 15, two of them in the resort of Varadero and the rest in the keys of the center-north of the island, areas devastated by Hurricane Irma.

“Meliá Cuba announces the reopening of hotels affected by Hurricane Irma in Cayo Santa María, Cayo Coco, Cayo Guillermo and Varadero,” the company said in a statement sent to EFE. continue reading

The company, based in Mallorca, offered thanks to the “cooperation of the Cuban tourism authorities” which made it possible to identify “in a short period of time the facilities that suffered damages due to the intense storm.”

The group also announced that it will offer “renovated products for the peak season,” due to the improvements made in the facilities during the almost month-long closure.

The first to resume services will be the Meliá Peninsula Varadero and the Paradisus Varadero, which will reopen on October 15.

Following will be those in Cayo Santa María (Villa Clara province); the Meliá Cayo Santa María and Meliá Las Dunas hotels will be open on November 1, while the Meliá Buenavista and the Sol Cayo Santa María will resume operations on November 15.

In the Jardines del Rey archipelago, where Irma touched down as a category 5 hurricane – the maximum on the Saffir-Simpson scale – the Sol Cayo Coco will reopen on October 17 followed three days later by the Meliá Cayo Guillermo.

The Meliá Jardines del Rey will restart its services on November 1, and will be followed by the Meliá Cayo Coco opening on the 4th and the Sol Cayo Guillermo on the 15th.

Between August 8 and 10, the powerful Hurricane Irma hit the Cuban coast from east to west, affecting 13 of the island’s 15 provinces, causing 10 deaths and substantial material damages to housing, infrastructure and agriculture.

More than 1.8 million people were evacuated to safe places, including thousands of vacationers along the north coast of the country, who were relocated to Trinidad (south) and Varadero, about 90 miles from Havana, which was also affected by the storm.

Activist In Exile: It Is Sad That a “Tyrant” Dies and Freedom Doesn’t Come

Ramon Saul Sanchez, president of the Democracy Movement. (14ymedio)
Ramon Saul Sanchez, president of the Democracy Movement. (14ymedio)

14ymedio biggerEFE/via 14ymedio, 26 November 2016 — Ramon Saul Sanchez, leader of the Cuban exile organization Democracy Movement, lamented today that the death of a “tyrant,” as he defines Fidel Castro, will not mean “freedom for the people of Cuba”.

“It is the greatest sadness that I have in my heart,” the activist told EFE; like many others in Miami the news of Castro’s death got him out of bed. continue reading

“I wish I could tell you that the tyrant’s death is people’s freedom,” but in the case of Cuba is not so “because they (the Castros) managed the succession very well.”

According to Sanchez, if Castro had died while in the exercise of power, it could have sparked a revolt in Cuba to demand freedom, but as his brother Raul is in office, the impact will not be the same.

For the leader of the Democracy Movement, Fidel Castro is a symbol of terror that Cuba has suffered for almost 60 years and his legacy is “fear, prisons, pain, rafters, etc…”

Cuba’s Private Restaurants, Struggling Not to Die of Success / EFE-14ymedio, Lorena Canto

The famous and government higher ups choose private restaurants for their meals in Cuba. Rihanna at the La Fontana paladar. (Twitter)
The famous and government higher ups choose private restaurants for their meals in Cuba. Rihanna at the La Fontana paladar. (Twitter)

EFE/via 14ymedio, Lorena Canto, Havana – Private restaurants, popularly known as paladares (palates), are under the scrutiny of the Cuban government, which has temporarily suspended the granting of licenses in the sector due to alleged breaches of rules in a booming industry that perfectly illustrates the new economy of the island.

“There has been very strong growth in a short time and it has gotten out of hand,” the self-employed owner of a very famous private restaurant in Havana told EFE, as she prepared for inspections by the authorities in the coming weeks.

In Cuba where, with the lack of official confirmations, the rumor mill runs riot, a few days ago alarm spread among paladares on hearing that the owners of the most prominent had been called to meetings – by neighborhood – with government officials. continue reading

There they were told that there would be no new licenses for private restaurants in the capital, and that there would be a round of strict inspections to ensure that those now in operation were complying with the law: no more than 50 seats, respect for the established hours, and provisioning only with products purchased in state stores for which they can show the receipts.

“The atmosphere is now very unclear,” another owner of a pioneering paladar, who also asked not to be named, told EFE.

So, the dining industry’s private proprietors, awaiting the dreaded inspections, fell into a paranoid spiral, which included hiding any merchandise not obtained through official means and redoing the menus to include only dishes and drinks made with ingredients for which they can show the receipts.

Bottles of premium liquor that came to Cuba in a suitcase, exotic ingredients or the celebrated lobsters, almost impossible to acquire by legal means and bought directly from fishermen, remain under lock and key these days, waiting for the dust to settle.

The problem is that the regulations governing self-employment, which are part of the economic reforms introduced by Raul Castro in the last decade, still have large gaps, like the lack of rules governing private workers on the communist island, or a wholesale supply market.

“It’s about sorting out a sector that started out as a part of the family economy and has become an important part of the country’s economy,” explained the same owner.

For some time now, the paladares have no longer been in the living rooms of a private house where the lady of the house cooked for four tourists, who in this way were given a peek into the daily life of a Cuban family.

There are 1,700 licensed paladares in Cuba, hundreds of them in Havana, restaurants that rival international standards in quality, in original décor and in service, and that from the beginning of the thaw with the United States two years ago have received visitors such as Barack Obama, Madonna and The Rolling Stones.

But in addition to competing with each other, they also compete with ordinary Cubans at the supermarkets, because one of the great problems of the industry is that it must be supplied at the same outlets as the rest of the population, given the lack of any wholesale market, the opening of which would be in the state’s hands alone.

“The competition for products creates unrest among the population, although it is not the direct fault of the self-employed,” says the same source.

In the state supermarkets – the only kind that exist in Cuba – EFE was able to observe how national brands of beer barely last an hour on the shelves, as the restaurants carry them out by the box full. The same thing happens with soft drinks and products like chicken breasts and milk.

Hence, she adds, the private restaurants have long demanded a wholesale market, which would also benefit the authorities “because it would allow better fiscal control over the purchase invoices.”

Another nuance of the situation, says one source, is the “special sensitivity” of the government to issues such as prostitution and drug trafficking, banned and severely punished on the Island, or access for minors to places where alcohol is served.

The current legislation provides licenses only for restaurants and cafes, so under these categories night bars have begun to proliferate, some of which have been closed down in recent weeks, although this has not been confirmed by any official source.