Castro celebrates birthday amid reports of tension with successor
BY JUAN O. TAMAYO
jtamayo@ElNuevoHerald.com
A clearly revived Fidel Castro marks his 84th birthday Friday,
officially out of government yet holding veto power over brother Raúl's
plans for economic reforms and hopes for improved U.S. relations.
That much is pretty certain, said analysts in Cuba and abroad who have
watched Fidel make a dozen unusually public appearances after a
near-fatal health crisis in 2006 that forced him out of the limelight.
What remains less clear is the balance of power between Fidel and Raúl,
amid reports of tensions between the brothers and hints that the
succession from the older to the younger Castro is far from settled.
Fidel appears to have gained back some of his weight and seemed lucid
and even engaging in his recent appearances, though at times he has
appeared tired and made some errors in his comments.
Unlike earlier this year, when he was often seen walking around his
closely guarded neighborhood west of Havana, Fidel now walks with the
aid of a tall bodyguard who steadies him by the elbow.
Yet, he remains the iconic leader of a revolution that has ruled Cuba
for five decades -- as well as first secretary of the governing
Communist Party. Raúl, 79, succeeded Fidel as president in 2008, but
remains second secretary of the party.
``Power remains in the hands of Fidel because he still heads the Party,
which the constitution says is the country's top leadership force,''
noted Vladimiro Roca, a Havana dissident and son of a founder of Cuba's
pre-revolution communist party.
Cuban Cardinal Jaime Ortega told U.S. officials during a recent visit to
Washington that Fidel retains veto powers over key issues, said a Cuba
analyst who asked for anonymity to protect his sources.
Not so, said Armando F. Mastrapa, who runs a blog on Cuba's
political-military affairs, www.cubapolidata.com . He argued Raúl
prodded his brother back into the limelight to show the new government
is in full control.
``There is no doubt that Raúl and his acolytes are in total control of
the country. Fidel is no longer the controller-in-chief but rather the
controlled-in-chief,'' Mastrapa said.
Others believe the Castro have established a ``co-government,'' with
Fidel focusing on international affairs and Raúl handling domestic
issues under his brother's careful eye.
Whatever the balance of power between the brothers, Fidel's spate of
recent appearances have raised eyebrows for their timing and context,
although his comments focused largely on his repeated warnings of the
threat of nuclear war in Iran and the Korean Peninsula.
His first appearance was at the National Center for Scientific
Investigations in Havana on July 7 -- the very day Ortega announced Raúl
had agreed to free 52 political prisoners. Fidel has never mentioned the
prisoner release, the biggest since 1998, in public.
On July 26, Fidel delivered a floral arrangement at the monument to
independence hero José Martí in Havana, at the same time Raúl was in the
central city of Santa Clara for the official act marking the start of
the revolution. Despite widespread anticipation that Raúl would unveil
some economic reforms, he did not speak in Santa Clara.
And on Aug. 7, Fidel addressed a special session of the legislative
National Assembly of People's Power, which he had requested, in his
first official government act since 2006.
While he wore sports clothes during his initial appearances, Fidel later
switched to a military-styled jacket and pants in his traditional olive
green, though without any insignias of military rank.
Raúl , apparently referring to the reports of tensions between the
brothers, used the word ``unity'' 14 times during an Aug. 1 speech to
the National Assembly.
``The unity among revolutionaries, and between the leadership of the
revolution and the mayority of the people, is our most important
strategic weapon,'' he declared. ``Even if it pains our enemies, our
unity is today more solid than ever.''
What's more, the day after Fidel addressed the Assembly, the newspaper
Granma published a front-page photo of the brothers talking at the
special session -- though Cuban television's broadcast of the event
showed they barely interacted.
Fidel himself coyly denied that he still wielded any official power in
an interview with the Venezuela-based Telesur television network this week.
``What I do is to talk about things and events so that each person can
decide,'' he said. ``You have to understand that the compañeros [in
government] are not people that I should be leading by the finger,
taking by the hand to do things. What I want is that they think.''
At the root of Fidel return to the spotlight appears to be a wish to
preserve two key pillars of his legacy that his brother may weaken: a
Soviet-styled economy tightly controlled by the government, and a
visceral hostility toward Washington.
``I would say everyone in Cuba is waiting for, wishing for, demanding
the economic changes that Raúl has been talking about, and that all
agree the biggest factor in the internal opposition is none other than
Fidel,'' said Domingo Amuchastegui, a former foreign policy analyst with
Cuba's Interior Ministry now living in Miami.
While Fidel has been repeatedly warning that the U.S. ``empire'' could
start a nuclear war, Cardinal Ortega told The Washington Post last week
that Raúl remains deeply interested in improving Cuba-U.S. relations.
``Fidel Castro's last battle is designed to cut off the positive vibes
that relations between the Cuban and U.S. governments are rapidly
gaining,'' Norberto Fuentes, a long-time member of the Castro brothers'
inner circle who now lives in Miami, wrote in an article published in
the website Cubaencuentro.com.
Any mayor change in Cuba's direction would have to be approved by a full
congress of the Communist Party. Raúl announced that one would be held
in the last half of 2009, then put it on hold indefinitely. On Aug. 1,
he said a commission is preparing the session but gave no date.
``Last year, people expected a congress because they were counting on
Fidel having died by that time. While Fidel lives there will be no
congress, because he will be the first to block it,'' said Roca.
Differences between the brothers have been reported occasionally since
the 1950s, with Raúl always bowing to Fidel's decisions but sometimes
retreating to sulk in remote parts of the country.
Yet Cuba-watchers say unconfirmed reports coming out of the island,
where its leadership rules in near-total secrecy, hint at a bitter
struggle that includes mutual backstabbings.
According to one such report, Fidel followers last year denounced
corruption by a close Raúl ally, Civil Aviation Institute President
Rogelio Acevedo. In retaliation, Raúl's allies denounced corruption by a
long-time Fidel protegé, Chilean businessman Max Marambio.
``Fidel knows that if Raúl wins he will not only consolidate his
government but also open the door to the danger that all of his legacy
will be swept away,'' Fuentes wrote.
Fidel obstructions of his brother's rule is dangerous, Fuentes added in
the article, titled `The next coup d'etat.''
``For a lot less than that,'' he wrote, ``they both have sent a lot of
people before firing squads.''
http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/08/12/v-fullstory/1773578/castro-celebrates-birthday-amid.html
No comments:
Post a Comment