A new project for a socialist country?
They wonder: Will the Congress adopt a new project for a socialist country? (Photo: Ramy-PS/PW)
By Manuel Alberto Ramy
In a few hours, the Sixth Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba will go into session. This event assumes the highest importance, because the idea is to discuss and approve the guidelines of the nation’s economic and social policy, the whole of which is officially called An Actualization of the Existing Model.
To many local economists, the Guidelines Project that will be debated during the CPC’s Congress constitutes the most important document of the past 50 years and goes beyond the framework of an actualization.
In good measure, it outlines a different country and a different society, where the dynamic of varied interests apparently will perform an outstanding role. Upon reading the Guidelines and looking at them as if they were a compass, one can appreciate that, while at the vertex the opening is moderate, its sides open wide.
Until now, the Guidelines have been only a document, although several of them, like those related to a limited opening to private initiative in various sectors, mainly the service sector, were instituted months ago.
And some of them have not been comprehensive, such as Law 259, which, though it allowed the leasing of 1 million 180,000 hectares of idle land to new producers for usufruct, cannot encompass the whole cycle of production-commercialization.
This example and others reveal the stubborn resistance of bureaucrats, people who are highly qualified in the art of preserving their “little fiefdoms.” And the best way to confront bureaucrats of all kinds is for the citizens to exert control and supervision.
Apropos the participation of citizens, I have learned that two thirds of the 291 proposals contained in the Guidelines have been modified, fixed, corrected, etc., thanks to 2 million 600,000 proposals made by citizens who attended factory assemblies, service centers, neighborhood gatherings and meetings of CPC nuclei. The figure seems to me interesting. Its real meaning will lie in the direction taken by the modifications. That, I do not know.
Will the delegates to the Congress be in tune with the popular vibrations? With which? With the opinions of experts on different issues? Changes of mind don’t happen in unison with material changes, especially when they involve shifts of at least 180 degrees, as is the case today. And the losses of power that they entail mean putting a “curve” on decisions, delaying them, domesticating them.
Today, on this sunny and hot day when the traffic has been rerouted to accommodate the preparations for the military parade marking the 50th anniversary of the Bay of Pigs victory, many Havana residents are asking themselves: Will the Congress adopt a new project for a socialist country?
We shall continue with this topic.
