On Wednesday, April 19th-2023, the 470-member Cuban parliament re-elects Miguel Diaz-Canel to his second 5-year term as President of Cuba. He was born 62-years-ago, right after the triumph of the Fidel Castro-led Cuban Revolution defeated the U.S.-backed Batista dictatorship on January 1st, 1959. Diaz-Canel is the first non-Castro since 1959 to lead Cuba.
The headline above is by London-based Reuters.
The Reuters article explained that Diaz-Canel's first five years as President of Cuba included added sanctions from the Trump-Biden adminstrations that enhanced the six-decade-old Economic Embargo of the nearby island nation. Also, Diaz-Canel had to deal with disastrous fires-explosions that destoryed a key tourist hotel in Havana as well as the island's main fuel facility in Matanzas. Discussing the "record 220,000 Cubans" that reached the U.S.-Mexican border in 2022, Reuters added: "He {Diaz-Canel} has also wrestled with sanctions imposed on the country by the then-U. S. President Donald Trump, piling onto a decades-long trade embargo." In other words, Reuters reminded the world that President Diaz-Canel has had to deal with history's longest and cruelest economic Embargo that any small nation has ever endured.
The Reuters article quoted Dr. Carlos Alzugaray about what to expect from President Diaz-Canel's second 5-year term as President of Cuba that starts on April 19th, 2023. Dr. Alzugaray was born 80-years-old ago in Havana and as a Professor and Diplomat he is still the person most honest News Sources turn to for true insight about what relates to Cuba.
As shown above, Dr. Alzugaray told Reuters that somehow trying to revive the Cuban economy in the face of the devastating U. S. Embargo as well as Cuba's own economic mistakes is the nearly impossible challenge confronting President Diaz-Canel: "Diaz-Canel will be looking to cement his legacy in his second term, but must effect the changes the country needs, Alzugaray said."
Although born after Fidel Castro's Cuban Revolution replaced the Batista/Mafia dictatorship in 1959, President Diaz-Canel idolizes both Fidel Castro and the Revolution.
Although Fidel Castro's tomb in Santiago de Cuba is almost 500 miles from Havana, President Diaz-Canel often visits the shrine to pay homage to his idol.
Well known to Cubans from his days as Education Minister, President Diaz-Canel is believed to be supported as Cuba's leader by most of the everyday citizens whom he also often visits across the island. Yet...as he now begins his second 5-year term as Cuba's President, the odds appear to be stacked against his attempts to revive the dismal Cuban economy that is endlessly shackled so powerfully by its Northern Neighbor that remains the richest and most influential nation in the world.
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