E-mail updates
Follow on Twitter
Subscribe to RSS
Marcelino Vazquez / Ain Foto via Reuters
Former Cuban leader Fidel Castro, 86, speaks to reporters at a polling station in Havana on Sunday. The appearance marked Castro's first extended period in the public eye since 2010.
HAVANA — Retired leader Fidel Castro voted in Cuba's general election on Sunday and chatted with well-wishers and local reporters in Havana for more than an hour in his first extended public appearance since 2010.
Castro had voted from his home in three previous elections since taking ill in 2006 and ceding power to his brother Raul two years later.
A stooped, snow-white-bearded Castro, 86, was seen on state-run television as he cast his ballot in the late afternoon, wearing a blue plaid shirt and light blue jacket.
The announcer said Castro talked about efforts to reform the economy, Latin American integration and other matters, including ailing Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
He was heard in a weak voice praising popular participation in Sunday's election.
"The people are truly revolutionary. They have really sacrificed. We don't have to prove it; history will. Fifty years of the (U.S.) blockade and they haven't given in," he said.
A look at the life and times of the Cuban leader who has outlasted nine U.S. presidents.
Cubans went to the polls to elect a Communist Party-selected slate of 612 deputies to the National Assembly and more than 1,000 delegates to provincial assemblies during a time of change in how they live and work but not in how they vote.
President Raul Castro and other leaders were also shown on television casting their ballots and commenting on the importance of the election as a show of support for reforms and independence from the United States.
Raul Castro is decentralizing the state-dominated economy, allowing more space for private initiatives in agriculture and retail services, and he has lifted many restrictions on personal freedoms, such as travel and buying and selling homes and cars.
He has also introduced term limits (two five-year stints) for top government posts, but he has drawn the line at legalizing other political parties and contested elections.
Ted Piccone, deputy director of foreign policy at the Washington think tank the Brookings Institution, said Raul Castro's policies provide interesting insights for observers of the government, which continues to have a tense relationship with the United States.
"The one-party elections in Cuba, alongside steady but slow progress on opening the economy, represent how the current regime intends to manage change on the island -- giving the people more space to participate in the economy while controlling their role in politics and civic life," Piccone said.
Some 95 percent of Cuba's 8.7 million residents over 16 years of age were expected to cast ballots with polling stations on just about every block. Abstention is frowned upon.
'All revolutionaries'
Reuters talked with more than half a dozen voters before they entered the polls in Havana. None of them knew the candidates on the national slate from their districts.
"What's certain is they are all revolutionaries and that's what matters," said retiree Eduardo Sanchez.
"I vote because I feel I have to, and it doesn't really matter because the deputies have no power anyway," said one young woman, who declined to give her name.
The curious read biographies of candidates posted at the polls, then cast paper ballots in cardboard voting boxes guarded by school students.
Others simply entered the polls and checked a box for the entire slate.
The candidates were equal to the number of positions up for a vote, the only alternative being to not vote for a certain candidate or leave blank or spoil the ballot.
Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.
Leave a Comment:
Keeping Castro in our news from time to time is very nice of you Globalists. He voted -you don't say ? What for ? To keep the BIG LIE going ? As Stalin said : " it is not important who votes, but who counts the votes". We noticed that ourselves in Florida.
So we keep on pretending that he is a dangerous enemy ( he would not let our gansters run his country) and keep his people poor by sanctions and him in power-all to keep the endless war profiteers happy. To just normalize relations, have free exchange of people and goods so that both American and Cuban people can profit from makes just too much sense. Our leadership somehow must create misery and a constant State of Alarm to mess everything up. Insanity sems to rule.
Joe, you have no idea of Castronomics, the people of Cuba are not poor due to sanctions rather poor due to the Genocidal tyranical rule of Castro and his henchmen for the past half century. Castro keeps talking both sides of the coin, blames Capitalism for his country's problem but then also blames the sanction of capital for his country's problems. With Castronomics were any good, it would be able to overcome the sanctions/
He can normalize relations as soon as all vestiges of the Castro Regime and Henchmen are removed from power. Otherwise, there is no "free exchange of people and goods" of the common people of Cuba becuase Castronomics is in the way of the "free exchange of people and goods" in Cuba
You mentioned "As Stalin said : " it is not important who votes, but who counts the votes". We noticed that ourselves in Florida." Which is the only reason Allen West lost his seat.
End these ridiculous decade long sanctions against Cuba NOW!
I'ts obvious to everyone but Castro that the "election" was a joke. Keep the sanctions in place!
(Why can't Newsvine get rid of trash like Gremislav?)
It's a free country JK. Freedom of speech. Yes Gremislav is a fool but you can't take away freedom of speech.
marlen, Maybe you should move to Cuba and get back to us on how ridiculous the sanctions really are. Oh and decade long? Try five decades and counting. Fidel Castro got rid of the gangsters in Cuba only to partner up with a new sponsor,the then Soviet Union which he allowed to build ICBM missle silo's on the island. Pay back's are a b!tch
I see all of the weenie white boys from Miami are on line. Thats right white boys. The ethnicity of Cuba changed because the light skin people split after Castro. The embargo is stupid, all it does all it does is unify the country against the US. We should have invaded them with Hollywood, VCR, McDonalds etc. The Miami Cubans still have this dream they can return it to like before, guess what it is not going to happen. The most dangerous threat with the current govt. is interaction with the rest of the world. A tiny minority in Floriday should not be running our foreign policy.
WoW...Did he have his long time commie buddy at his side .. Cesar Chavez..?
Is that guy still alive..?
Cuba: Free Public Education through college, universal public health care, some of the best doctors in the world. All without being able to trade with the Fascist, neo-capitalist, Zionist-Nazi monetary system monopolizing war profiteer dominated chutzpa of a sheeple nation as a next door neighbor. Geeze, I was trying to sarcastically portray antiSemitizm here but somebody commenting above forgot that Karl Marx was a Jew. I wonder if Israel would send over some of their nuclear weapons if we were being attacked by Canada? Oh that would make those Canadians livid...
Cuba received up to $23 million a day in economic aid and trade from the Soviets until 1989. End of story.
Unfortunately, our trade embargo ban of buying sugar cane from Cuba and our substitution of high fructose corn syrup instead has contributed to the high incidence of diabetes in our country.
Good to see Fidel Castro is alive and kicking. I like and greatly respect Him.
The only news about this guy that I want to see is his obituary!
Hey, "Kurts Comments"... you're the one who doesn't know what you're talking about. You believe everything the right wing media has thrown at you about Castro obviously. No doubt you're an Obama supporter too. Just for the record... I've been to Cuba and it's not what the media claims it to be. Get your facts straight before you correct someone.
stu, I am an OBama supporter and I don't agree with kurts comments. So you think you know what Obama supporters generally feel regarding Cuba? Get your facts straight before you correct someone
Stu, Exactly what of Castro's Despotism is "not" correct? If you want the Real Cuba is like, well, the obvious place to find out is http://www.therealcuba.com/ without actually being one of his political prisoners. I know, I know, per Stu, all Cuban Dissidents and Political Prisoners, are made up by the "right wing media". So whenever Stu is writing against the "right wing media", he is desperately trying to defend against the facts. Stop calling those who call for human rights in Cuba as just the "Right Wing Media", bird parts are not the issue here.
BTW, as gofins states, this article has nothing to do with Obama support or not. Stu, yet again trying to protect his Despot friend, Castro, from the truth of human rights abuses in Cuba.
to all of you , go and live in cuba who does never live there , and live like a current cuban and you will say what it is in the right way.. live like a cuban with your salary and then you tell me what dog life is that?
Yaicara, regretably, you are 100% correct. The life of the average Cuban under Castronomics is miserable indeed. Look forward to the day of a Post Castro Henchmen Regime.
When the heck is this thug going to reach room temperature?
My thoughts exactly, except his hole family needs to be gone and let the people of Cuba have thier island back.
Yep let Batista and the Zio-Nazi capitalist pig mafia who killed many innocents and enslaved the Cuban people to the Central Bankster world order should return screw them all up the bum hole like they used to. They can tell us they liberated the people of Cuba and take away free public education through college, universal national health care and all the other benefits of a humane culture. Make Cuba the 51st state replace all they accomplished with the whims of the few infinitely greedy inbred sociopaths. The World Order based on monetary system monopoly selling weapons to ruthless dictators and then telling the US people that we must go fight and die to take the weapons they sold them back. Yes replace communism and socialism with infinite greed now. Infinite greed of a few, propaganda, war profiteering, breeding like lemmings until a final judgement day of extinction is the highest form of human civilization possible. Hurray Amerika Hurray! The may the Hebrew god save us from ourselves!
i am a Cuban i left Cuba many years ago and i don't see any changes there i don't feel like going back , them Catro's are nothing good to that beautiful place . i agree with Brandy here let the people get our island back, embargo yeah! but what about our internal embargo actually people from other region cubans just like me need a permit to come to the other side of the island , thats real s..t like they are aliens we dont have no freedom ,no rights now they gave the oportunity for cubans to travel and guess what? so many ways of making their way out of the country more difficult oh lord! , i hate them i hate the way they have treat our people. yes! history will see for it self that cubans have remainded there trying but always with the fear inside for that horrible system that is aplyed there. i cant wait for a revolution i keep on asking my self why ? is because we are peaceful people or we just afraid? am ready to fight for my country to get it back , and put them jackass out for once of of them! .. vivi en el monstruo y le conosco las entranas .. i lived in the monster and i know him well.. and i had a friend that used to say que viva castro, pero que viva lejos! ..long live castro , but live far from me..
Ojala en pronto tiempo, Castro se va a "vivir lejos" de aqui.... en infierno
Be careful that is Chavez boyfriend!!
National elections ? Please ......Electing government officials from a pool of "pre-selected" lemmings ....is not what I would call a "National Election".....And I thought our choices here in America sucked. Fidel still blames America for his failure over 50 years later. Maybe this is our future ...
@PValdes
Your comment is the only one that made any sense to me. I couldn't even follow the others.
The concept of voting is rather distorted when the governing single party of a country (whether it names itself "Communist" or otherwise) determines, in advance, which individuals will appear on the ballot. It entirely undermines the idea of representing the will of the people.
Our choices here in the U.S.A. are not so good, granted. Presumably we have only our collective self to blame. In the past, I think that would have been accurate. Now it seems less so. There is a great deal of dissatisfaction with elected officials in the U.S., which makes one wonder why they are elected if their campaign positions are not beneficial to the electorate!
The U.S. electorate is NOT oblivious and passive. It has been forgiving and slow to rouse, as that is the easier path. Wise law makers and leaders would know this, and govern so that fairness and balance were expected outcomes, not exceptions.
Liselotte....We are one party away from the same fate. This Country is divided into two camps. "Haves" and "havenots". It is the same problem that plagued Cuba in the early 50's. Castro was born of this condition. The representation of the American people in Washington has been corrupted. It is for this reason that I do not vote down "party lines". I vote for those who I find to be the most genuine....These people increasingly hard to find in our system. I once reassured my mother "Mom...what happened in Cuba will never happen here". She then warned me ... "Never take your freedom for granted and never trust what you're being told....Look and see with your own eyes ". Sadly, I now know she was absolutely correct. We are losing our country much as she lost hers.
Right there with you man.............
"National elections? Please..." Bush lost the popular vote in 2000, so much for elections. It is not a democracy unless selected officials can be bought by the highest bidder. Yep, United States of ZioNaziland sheeple speaks of lemmings. What ever you are doing with the bottom end of that flag pole it seems a bit masochistic to me, I feel sorry for you.
@PValdes, you mother is so right now all there is to do convince 1.5 million or so of this.
PLandH -------------------AMERICA IS NOT A DEMOCRACY--------------------IT IS A REPUBLIC. Get it right ....
PV: A republic form of government the last I heard was a representaive democracy. Besides that, I feel sorry for you because you seem like some sort of an autistic special person that can type but not read? I never wrote that the US is a democracy. I wrote sarcastically and truthfully, that the so called elected officials act as if," It is not a democracy unless selected officials can be bought by the highest bidder." So there ya go Chief Stick-in- the-mud. Get it left, right is like Hitler, left is like Geronimo.
PLandH ......your babbling is incoherent at best. Maybe they put something in your kool aid..... You should check it for mercury or antifreeze.
Fidel challenge and win until now his bitter enemies here in USA, american and worms cubans, many of them long time are undergriund, no trace of them, that said something ? God is in his side, liked or no.
Dios no tiene nada que ver con ese hijo de puta. Al infierno ......
Oye, no insulta puta caundo estas habalando sobre El Despota.
Ha ! Nice Kurt ....
With Chavez already dead or in the Coma, they had to drag out Castro into the Public. Either way, they are both better off dead for they made human rights in their respective countries as good as dead.
Obama is in office. Why is the 1959 blockade still being enforced ? What is so "glorious" about Castro and the Cuban "revolution" in 2013 ? It was important in 1959 but in 2013 ? Castro is an historic icon, given that, why can t this island move on. This bit of history is done.
The revolution - what ever that means in 2013 - is accomplished and complete. No threat to the U.S. Of no importance to the Russians ..but maybe to Iran or Hugo Chavez or Sean Pean. Obama supporters do not seem to care about taking steps to end this "embargo". The Cuban people have paid their dues to this suffocating "revolution" . What advantage is it to maintain it ? How does this help or promote the welfare and prosperity of the Cuban island people ? Obama and Congress can lift the embargo. Castro can simply say the Cuban people have evolved and matured and are ready to move on and enjoy the 21st century and its fruits. How about open access to the global internet ? Start with a new Apple store, freedom to explore world news and events, invest in the stock market, buy a NEW 2013 car, Starbucks, book stores, Cuban baseball teams playing in the US, movie theaters in Havana, US companies with facilities and offices in CUba. Cubans with real employment and real middle class earnings and real career paths. Cuban students enrolling in US universities. Now here is a REVOLUTION ! VIVA 2013 ! Release the energy that has been pent up for so long.
or Sean Pean
Not until the all the Castro Henchmen are removed from power, then Cuba by itself will have a political/relgious/economic revolution for the better (for Cuba, the US and the world). Need to remove all vestiges of the Castro Genocidal Virus from Society. Any Castro Henchmen still in power means the Tumor of Tyranny persists, need to get rid of all traces of it.
Larry LeBlanc,
I guess you haven't learned any lessons. That's why your asleep and are a liberal. You just don't get it, It's about absolute power and control.
We didn't embargo against the people of Cuba, we put it in place due to the communistic government that took over the lives of the people. Castro brought the russians in to help keep his country under check, he took his own peoples lives and crushed them under his boot because he believed in Stalin, who was nothing more than a serial killer phsyco path.
Everybody wants to through it on Obama. Get real. Read the first four small paras. and than scroll down to the Helms Burton Act. The Embargo is not as bad as you think. But I guess that as long as the Helms Burton Act is in place that the embargo will not be lifted. As far as I know Cuba has always had an Embassey here in the US. Cuba also had the bright idea that they would nationalize some properties here on Us Soil to be cuban. Anybody with 1 working brain cell knows that is not going to happen.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_embargo_against_Cuba
Hopefully when he croaks better days will be coming to Cubans. I bet they are waiting for those days.
Fidel's brother is alive and well, so I doubt there will be any major changes. I guess we all need to wait and see.
Possible but he's not Fidel so would have to make concessions to be as "popular". And the Cubans might tell him to "shovel" it if he hardens the tone.
(save the enviroment)Not all of them will be happy believe it or not. Its not what makes the Miami Cubans happy that matters,its about the ones that hung with their own country for better or worse, it's what ever makes the majority of Cubans living there happy that matters.
you might be right Gofins, but considering the political repression I doubt they're living happiness.
This is what happens to tyrants when they get
old and feeble. It's their turn to know what it
feels like to be vulnerable.
I didn't know the US had a blockade there, I thought they just didn't do business with them. Cuba is the land of the fair, everyone is poor, except of course, the party thugs. If you go there, BYO toilet paper.
I don't understand why we don't resume trade with Cuba, while we trade with many other Communist countries like China.
It's hard not to trade with the country that practically owns us.
We do trade with Cuba in a way. We sell to them on a cash only bases, but tht is for food and humanitarian needs like farm equipment and such.
He's alive because that Kennedy (__*__) screwed up the Bay of Pigs Invasion.
BS alert
Kennedy screwed up the Bay of Pigs invasion.?.? I think that there was something more going on than, than the Government would release and they haven't said anything about it yet. There is a big grey area there.
DARK STAR & gofins .....It was lack of communication by the CIA to the administration that "screwed up" the invasion. They all wanted to take the credit for the triumph ....and when it blew up in their face no one would take the blame. It was destined to be a failure from day one. The right hand did not know what the left hand was doing .
Sixty years after "communism" takes over in Cuba, and the place is still in shambles, and people are building boats out of old cars risking their lives to float 90 miles north to freedom (many do not make it). Castro insists history will prove him right, but did anyone ask him how much longer it would take? If it hasn't happened in 60 years, will it ever?
BTW, our trade and travel sanctions against Cuba are stupid and should be removed. We trade and allow travel to countries with much worse human rights issues than Cuba.
And we don't have a "blockade" against Cuba, just sanctions, that don't work either, after those same 60 years.
big whoop , old news on a non-relevant little island......
To think, if only this guy had channeled his energy and popularity in a positive manner for his countrymen how great a shape Cuba would be in today. He could have been elected president for life in an open and free society and all the citizens could have thrived. Sad.
You surely meant that IF he has sold out to the Yanks right from the start :))))))
He isn't much different that Hussain, he took over and once the power was his he went with it, he loved knowing that he could kill anyone without repercussion, he wanted to make all the people on the island fear him. His regime is made up of men with his mentality and as long as they can keep finding men that have no consciousness, no heart, no faith, no humanity, no morality then the people of Cuba will endure the past 60 years for next 60 years.
Hey marlen101917
Maybe you need to move to Cuba, the sactions were put in place probably before you were born and for good reason.
A LIVING GIANT among International and American "midgets", like Kennedy, Nixon, Reagan and other non-entities. Long live Fidel !!!
What's your middle initial .... " N." ??? You certainly have the brain to fit the name !!!
As long as Fidel lives, the poor Cubans will live in extreme poverty and squalor. As soon as they aged "Dick Tater" dies, progress can very slowly begin in Cuba.
Speaking Spanish from years of living in Guatemala, even though I am born and raised American, I visited Cuba through the back door. The black market flourishes in Cuba. Poverty Reins. It is one of the most backwards places on the planet. Education is considered sinful. It is a nation who has learned parasitic behavior for generations living off the rest of the world by back door deals, and dishonesty. Morals mean nothing. They even have a special script for visitors who are not allowed to use their money. When Fidel dies, they will have a hard time joining the rest of the world. "Productive" is not a word anyone will use for Cuba for generations to come.
anyone notice only the good die young???
i really only feel hate for somebody who uses their position to dictate their agenda not caring for what their people have to go through because the idiot is so pig headed and downright greedy he would drive themselves and their civilians to the bone because what one wants and not what a multitude of others actually needs
wishing fidel would just step off the planet
why be here if all you want are your own personal beliefs over what is actually needed to sustane your people a healthy lifestyle
hit the road fidel you were an idiot then as you are now
You must be very very old :)))
Gordo13---I am sure you meant Hugo Cahvez. BTW, last time i checked on him , he was still kicking some where in a Havana Hospital.
Yea Fidel! Hey, maybe Obama can go to Cuba and give one his long winded empty Commie speeches to the Cuban people, they have grown accustomed to them over the years and if they want to keep him on as el dictator they can have him! I'm sure that they could use some Hope and Change!
Personally, I believe Barry wants to be the same a Castro.
We went over 5 thousand miles to fight a war we couldn't win and we should have went 90 miles to Cuba, we turned our backs on the Cuban people.
A little over 50 years ago I was young, dumb, naive 18 year old. My friend and I were going to Cuba to help oust Batista. We got as far as Savannah and when we saw him putting people against a wall and shooting them we went back home.
As long as Fidel lives, the poor Cubans will live in extreme poverty and squalor. As soon as they aged "Dick Tater" dies, progress can very slowly begin in Cuba.
Speaking Spanish from years of living in Guatemala, even though I am born and raised American, I visited Cuba through the back door. The black market flourishes in Cuba. Poverty Reins. It is one of the most backwards places on the planet. Education is considered sinful. It is a nation who has learned parasitic behavior for generations living off the rest of the world by back door deals, and dishonesty. Morals mean nothing. They even have a special script for visitors who are not allowed to use their money. When Fidel dies, they will have a hard time joining the rest of the world. "Productive" is not a word anyone will use for Cuba for generations to come.
Is it really an election if you only have one choice on the ballot?