Cuba nominates Castro for parliament, setting stage for a return to the presidency

Cuba nominates Castro for parliament, setting stage for a return to the
presidency
By Ray Sanchez | Sun-Sentinel.com
4:52 PM EST, December 2, 2007

HAVANA - Ailing Cuban leader Fidel Castro, who has not been seen in
public in more than a year, was nominated to the national parliament
Sunday, setting the stage for a return to the presidency.

To cries of "Viva Fidel," the 81-year-old Castro was nominated
unanimously during a meeting of local electoral officials in the eastern
city of Santiago de Cuba, the birthplace of the revolution that brought
him to power in 1959.

If elected on Jan. 20 to parliament, known as the National Assembly,
Castro would be eligible to retain the presidency of Cuba's supreme
governing body, the Council of State. Occupying that office since it was
created in 1976, Castro also has served as head of government in his
capacity as president of the Council of Ministers.

There was no official word on whether Castro would accept the
nomination. But National Assembly President Ricardo Alarcon told
reporters in the capital on Sunday, "I am sure he will be the best
candidate you can have for president of the Council of State."

"I would vote with both hands for him to continue as president of the
Council of State," Alarcon said.

Castro handed over power temporarily to his brother Raul, the defense
minister, in July 2006 after emergency intestinal surgery.

At its first session in March, the National Assembly must select Cuba's
top political positions on the 31-member Council of State, including the
presidency.

Brian Latell, a Cuba analyst with the University of Miami's Institute
for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies, wrote in a newsletter that Raul
Castro might need to convince his older sibling to finally step aside.

"It may be … that this titanic, narcissistic, unyielding potentate may
have to have the power he has craved since the early 1950s wrenched out
from under him," Latell wrote in late November. "Only Raul Castro could
do that, and at this point in his brother's decline, and as troubles and
dissatisfaction on the island multiply, the defense minister and acting
president may realize that he will soon have no alternative but to do so."

While many Cubans on the island publicly praise Fidel Castro, they
privately admit that Castro should step aside so that his younger
brother can implement economic reforms to improve their living standards.

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