• America Elections in Cuba, between revolutionary machinery and abstention

Revolutionary "triumph" despite widespread apathy and the specter of abstention. The National Electoral Commission (CEN) has made public the first results, favorable to the government, which have immediately raised suspicion of irregularities among opponents and activists, despite being the largest abstention in parliamentary elections in history.

Almost six million Cubans (70.34%) would have voted up to two hours before the closing of the polls (the day was extended by one hour by order of the CEN), despite the limited presence in the schools, reported by observers and journalists who managed to evade the police siege. The final result would be above 75%, according to the transpolation of the results made by opposition groups.

Thus, in the absence of the last bulletin of the CEN, the electoral theater arranged by the Cuban regime would mean a "success" for President Miguel Díez-Canel, whose presidency for five years was also under examination. The "support" for his management would have grown strangely since the municipal elections of November 2022. On that occasion, only 68% of the electoral roll voted, an all-time low.

The 470 candidates for 470 seats were already considered ratified beforehand, whose first mission in April will be to re-elect Díaz-Canel for a new five-year presidential term.

The anti-revolutionary tendency of the "vote against" has been growing step by step from plebiscitary levels of more than 90%, increased after the popular rebellion of July 11, 2021. A trend that stopped yesterday, although if measured only with the parliamentary elections of five years ago, when the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) reached 85% of the vote, the rejection would have grown.

The PCC celebrated in advance the triumph of the revolution in the midst of the largest migration crisis in history: "Images coming from all over Cuba. Beautiful, inspiring. Each of them could, by itself, describe this day. Commitment, trust, commitment, the desire to fight for the common good. Each of them defines a word: revolution."

"The call for abstention in networks and digital media of our enemies failed. Long live Cuba!", harangued former Minister Abel Prieto after learning the first results. Nicolás Maduro, from Caracas, congratulated the "brother Cuban people" for ratifying their "firm and vigorous support for the revolutionary project. Let's march together to build a better world!"

In these first data, only votes against abstention are counted, in the absence of knowing how many Cubans chose to force their null vote or make it blank. Last year the sum of both exceeded 10%.

As expected inside and outside the island, State Security deployed a police operation to prevent the work of independent journalists and the action of electoral observers. Several arrests were reported, including that of Manuel Cuesta Morúa, vice-president of the Democratic Transition Council and leader of the social democratic Progressive Arc. EL MUNDO spoke with Morúa minutes before he was captured while witnessing the "low influx" of voters to schools in Centro Habana, one of the popular neighborhoods of the capital.

The activists managed to detect double voting (the same person in different places), coercion to force the vote and the shielding of the final counts at the tables, which could not be observed.

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