Elections, What For? / Fernando Dámaso

A woman participating in the municipal elections in Cuba is saluted by two schoolchildren as she deposits her ballot. (EFE)

Fernando Damaso, 6 March — On March 11, General Elections will be held in Cuba, to elect the delegates to the Provincial Assemblies of People’s Power and the deputies to the National Assembly.

What is original about these elections is that the voters will vote, but they will not really “elect” anyone, since these candidates have been “elected” previously by the National Candidacy Commission. This also happened at the municipal level.

In the Cuban elections, the only one where the elector “chooses” is at the lowest level, that is, on the block where he resides, and even there, the “election” is conditioned by the actions of the so-called “factors” (representatives of the official mass organizations, organized, controlled and directed by the Party), who veto, as possible nominees, those who do not consider themselves “faithful to the revolution,” that is, “faithful to the system.” This ensures that those who disagree or have opinions different from the official ones, do not form part of any level of the People’s Power from the base.

The Cuban electoral process, copied from the electoral processes that existed in the extinct socialist countries, but Cuban style, constitutes a great farce, with a great deal of propaganda to try to make us see what does not exist, with a single objective: to perpetuate in power characters from a single party.

The only interest of these elections, lies in the announced (and postponed) retirement of some historical elders from their posts (which remains to be seen), and the taking of their positions by some new characters, chosen and prepared by them.

Everything seems to indicate that it will be more of the same, although, perhaps, with another “look.”