Fidel Castro's enemies in exile have long predicted that the end of his reign in Cuba would bring dancing in the streets, a mass exodus and a rapid transition to a US-style democracy and market economy.
But almost six months after Castro stepped aside due to illness, the transition has occurred -- with none of those changes. Cubans are calmly going about their business. There has been no northbound rush of migrants and no signs of impending policy shifts.
Even if Castro recovers fully and returns to public life, officials no longer insist he will return to power.
Cuban officials have pulled off what their enemies have long said would be impossible: Building a post-Castro communist system.
About the only thing different in Cuba is that its government, instead of being led by a single person, is handled by a group. Raul Castro heads a collective leadership guided by the same Communist Party his older brother extolled during a nearly half-century in power.
"These guys know what they are doing. They are prepared to lead Cuba without Fidel," said Marifeli Perez-Stable of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington think tank. "The country, in the short run, is not going to collapse."
A senior US intelligence official said earlier this month that Raul Castro has the support and respect of military leaders critical to ensuring a leadership succession within the existing communist system.
Army Lieutenant General Michael Maples, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, said the temporary president is firmly in control and "will likely maintain power and stability after Fidel Castro dies, at least for the short-term."
Cuban officials say no single person can replace the 80-year-old Maximum Leader, who micromanaged projects, gave marathon speeches and entertained visitors at dinners lasting until dawn.
Raul Castro, the mustachioed longtime defense minister, now greets visiting dignitaries and military parades. But he hasn't kept his brother's long hours and reserves his evenings for family.
"The only substitute for Fidel can be the Communist Party of Cuba," the 75-year-old Raul Castro told university students last month.
The most visible official after Raul is Vice President Carlos Lage, who favors a white guayabera dress shirt and is said to drive himself around in a boxy little Russian Lada sedan. He exercises wide control over government administration, much like a prime minister.
Lage recently represented Cuba at Bolivia's constitutional convention and presidential inaugurations in Colombia and Ecuador. When Fidel ceded power in July, he gave Lage sole responsibility for his "energy revolution," the renovation of the country's antiquated electrical grid that is close to Castro's heart.
When a hiker fell from a 55m waterfall in wild New Zealand bush, rescuers were forced to evacuate the badly hurt woman without her dog, which could not be found. After strangers raised thousands of dollars for a search, border collie Molly was flown to safety by a helicopter pilot who was determined to reunite the pet and the owner. A week earlier, an emergency rescue helicopter found the woman with bruises and lacerations after a fall at a rocky spot at the waterfall on the South Island’s West Coast. She was airlifted on March 24, but they were forced to
HIGH HOPES: The power source is expected to have a future, as it is not dependent on the weather or light, and could be useful for places with large desalination facilities A Japanese water plant is harnessing the natural process of osmosis to generate renewable energy that could one day become a common power source. The possibility of generating power from osmosis — when water molecules pass from a less salty solution to a more salty one — has long been known. However, actually generating energy from that has proved more complicated, in part due the difficulty of designing the membrane through which the molecules pass. Engineers in Fukuoka, Japan, and their private partners think they might have cracked it, and have opened what is only the world’s second osmotic power plant. It generates
Showcasing phallus-shaped portable shrines and pink penis candies, Japan’s annual fertility festival yesterday teemed with tourists, couples and families elated by its open display of sex. The spring Kanamara Matsuri near Tokyo features colorfully dressed worshipers carrying a trio of giant phallic-shaped objects as they parade through the street with glee. The festival, as legend has it, honors a local blacksmith in the Edo Period (1603-1868) who forged an iron dildo to break the teeth of a sharp-toothed demon inhabiting a woman’s vagina that had been castrating young men on their wedding nights. A 1m black steel phallus sits in the courtyard of
Hundreds of Filipinos and tourists flocked to a sun-bleached field north of Manila yesterday, on Good Friday, to witness one of the country’s most blood-soaked displays of religious fervor, undeterred by rising fuel prices. Scores of bare-chested flagellants with covered faces walked barefoot through the dusty streets of Pampanga Province’s San Fernando as they flogged their backs with bamboo whips in the scorching heat. Agence France-Presse (AFP) journalists said they saw devotees deliberately puncturing their skin with glass shards attached to a small wooden paddle to ensure their bleeding during the ritual, a way to atone for sins and seek miracles from
RSS