Sunday, March 26, 2023

Votes not elections: Reflections on the Castro regime's electoral charade in Cuba

Dictator Raul Castro votes today in sham elections in Cuba.

The Castro regime is seeking to spin a non-vote into a democratic election, but there are some basic facts that exposes the true nature of what is going on. 

"Cuba holds National Assembly elections Sunday, but there are only 470 candidates running for the 470 seats, with no opposition challengers and no campaigning," reports the Associated Press. 

Why go through this political circus?

Professor Jaime Suchlicki of the Cuban Studies Institute offers an explanation of what the dictatorship's actual objective is:

"Like in most communist countries, elections in Cuba are not aimed at changing previously selected officials, but rather at highlighting existing polices and mobilizing the population to support the communist system." 

 This is not a secret, but established in existing regime rules. 

Cuba's 2019 constitution declares that the country is officially a one-party system with the Communist Party serving as the "superior driving force of the society and the state" and "orienting the communal forces" toward the creation of a "communist society." 

Internal democracy does not exist in the Cuban Communist Party.  It is a top down process.

Despite this, the Cuban dictatorship finds itself in a crisis. Cubans are losing their fear, and refusing to go along with the regime's charade.

Reuters, in their March 22, 2023 article "As Cuba Election Day Nears, Some Voters Ask, 'Why Bother?'" offers anecdotal evidence of voter apathy.

Like a growing number of Cubans, 77-year-old Havana resident Humberto Avila says he will likely sit out Sunday's legislative elections. The retired university professor says he's done the math - 470 candidates, 470 open seats - and sees no point in voting. "That's the same number of candidates as open seats," he told Reuters. "There are no choices."

Cuban dissidents in the island are calling on citizens not to take part in the sham. "Not attending the electoral farce orchestrated by the regime is an act of elementary consistency with truth and justice. No to tyranny," tweeted from Cuba Eduardo Cardet, national coordinator of the Christian Liberation Movement on March 24, 2023. 

As Professor Suchlicki observed above, this is not a question of electing representatives in a democracy, but measuring the communist dictatorship's ability to influence or coerce mass support for the system in a vote.

This is why the regime is threatening Cuban citizens with consequences if they do not participate in the regime's vote today.

This is also why they do not allow independent international observers, or independent domestic observers for today's vote, despite recognizing in law the ability of citizens to observe elections.

Cubans that had wanted to observe the elections today found police cars outside their homes, and were told that they were under house arrest, and could not leave.

 The dictatorship has reason to be concerned.

The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project in their March 23, 2023 report "Political Repression in Cuba Ahead of the 2023 Parliamentary Elections" predicted that "unaddressed grievances and repression might lead to lower voter turnout in the upcoming elections, which could, in turn, further undermine the legitimacy of Cuba’s next government." 

With no observers agents of the dictatorship can stuff the ballot boxes, and claim whatever result they want, but internally they will know the true level of dissatisfaction within the populace.

This dissatisfaction was observed on July 11-12, 2021 when tens of thousands of Cubans, knowing what dangers openly defying the regime entailed, took to the streets of Cuba in protest. 

Soviet dictator Josef Stalin in 1923 commented the following about elections,“I consider it completely unimportant who in the party will vote, or how; but what is extraordinarily important is this - who will count the votes, and how.” 

The effort to stop the poll watchers, though poll watching is permitted under current electoral law in Cuba, hearkens back to that principle of control alluded to by Stalin 100 years ago.

This is why Cubans should stay home, and abstain from taking part in this charade.

 

One last, but important observation that many have gotten wrong. Cuba has not entered the post-Castro era.

Osvaldo Dorticós Torrado and Miguel Díaz-Canel

President Osvaldo Dorticós Torrado held the title of president from July 17, 1959 through December 2, 1976. Cubans called him "president spoon" (because he neither pricks [like a fork] nor cuts [like a knife]). It was their way of saying he had no real power because it resided with Fidel Castro and his brother Raul.

Miguel Díaz-Canel, the current president of Cuba is another Dorticós Torrado, a figure head without any power. Raul Castro remains the strong man, and his son Alejandro Castro Espin, the heir apparent.


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