The sudden death this week of Cuban vice president and defense minister General Julio Casas Regueiro underscores the challenge Cuba faces replacing a generation of revolutionary leaders who are now in their eighties, analysts say.
Cuban President Raul Castro’s right-hand man, Casas Regueiro was the No. 4 person in the Cuban hierarchy when he dropped dead of a heart attack on Saturday at the age of 75.
Above him on the power pyramid is the president, who celebrated his 80th birthday in June; Cuban First Vice President Jose Ramon Machado, who will be 81 next month; and the historic revolutionary commander Ramiro Valdes, who turned 79 in April.
Photo: Reuters
“This death is a warning to Raul that there is little time left to retire the generation of historic leaders. It’s a call to think seriously about replacements and the rejuvenation of the top leadership of the Communist Party [of Cuba, PCC],” Cuba analyst Arturo Lopez-Levy of the University of Denver said.
A loyalist among loyalists, Casas Regueiro was only the second defense minister since the Cuban revolution in 1959.
In 2008, he succeeded Raul Castro, who for about half a century served as defense minister under his elder brother Fidel, before officially succeeding the ailing Fidel Castro as president in February 2008.
Raul Castro has been trying to push through minor reforms of Cuba’s centrally planned economy, including more self-employment and slashing the country’s massive bureaucracy.
Next in line to succeed Casas Regueiro is Cuban First Deputy Minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces’ General Leopoldo Cinta Frias, 70, who is expected to be officially nominated to the post after three days of mourning for his predecessor.
Besides his military activities, Casas Regueiro played a key role in promoting a major reform of the Cuban economic system, which was modeled on the Soviet system in the 1970s and severely crippled by the collapse of the Soviet bloc in the 1990s.
As guardian of the military’s finances, he helped make the military a major player in the Cuban economy under the aegis of the Group of Enterprise Administration, whose flagship Gaviota holding company has invested in multiple areas, notably tourism.
“He contributed to creating rational economic management by the military, in contrast with the civilian sector,” said Oscar Espinosa Chepe, a dissident Cuban economist.
Now aged and frail is the country’s revolutionary icon Fidel Castro, 85, whose ill health led him to cede power five years ago.
Retired at home, Fidel Castro now spends his time writing books and “reflections” on international issues — he has so far published 361 such works — from his home in western Havana, which he shares with his wife Dalia Soto del Valle.
At the end of a PCC congress in April that approved minor economic reforms, the average age of the members of the party’s decision-making Politburo was lowered from 70 to 67. However, that was achieved mainly by reducing its size from 19 to 15, as only three of its members are under the age of 65.
“The other historic leaders of the revolution have little time left. The death of the armed forces chief underscores the absurdity of trying to cling to the past and resist reforms,” said Michael Shifter, president of Washington-based Inter-American Dialogue.
During the party congress, Raul Castro admitted it was “truly shameful” that Cuba has not put in place “a reserve of replacements,” with the experience and maturity needed to lead the party and the government.
He then announced that people holding key offices would be limited to two terms of five years each. And he convened a party conference for January next year charged with finding ways of renewing the party rank and file.
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