The President of the Republic of Cuba, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, and his wife Lis Cuesta arrived at 7:48 in the morning at school 3 of constituency 57, in the municipality of Playa, where they exercised their right to vote in the popular referendum. of the Family Code.
At the end of the process, he told the press that it is going to be an intense day, which we arrived at as a result of a process that had to do with the construction of a fair, necessary, up-to-date, modern regulation that gives rights and guarantees to all people and diversities of families and creeds.
The president said that the Family Code has gone through a broad popular discussion process that has allowed a group of modifications. He recalled that they have worked with more than 25 versions of this legal norm.
“This Code started from popular debate, from a social need. In recent years our society has become more heterogeneous, Cuban families have changed and new types of relationships have appeared. There were debts with the treatment from legal norms to certain issues of inheritance and affection, and I think it was fair that they were taken into account at a time like this.
Díaz-Canel said that the regulations were also based on the study of situations and court cases, of the daily experiences of different types of families, of events that have occurred at a certain time, personal experiences. From these experiences —said the president— it is better understood why a Code was needed.
“The expectation is not that it will be a unanimous vote, but I do believe that it will be majority by our people,” said the president.
Likewise, he recognized that the Family Code includes issues that the people of Cuba still cannot understand.
“I think that in 62 years we have not overcome a criterion of patriarchy in some families, nor the understanding of diversity.”
We have respected the law and the opinion of all —said the first secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba—, but there are people who have not understood that the Code does not deny the family they defend, but rather gives guarantees to that type and to others.
In his words to the press, Díaz-Canel said that there is a whole platform against the Code that starts from the demonization and discredit of the Cuban Revolution.
“There are people who demonstrate against the Code, especially on social media, using vulgar and hateful language. If the Code said the opposite of what it says, those haters would be criticizing it too. It is not a problem of convictions, reasoning, rationality or feelings, there are simply people who adopt that position because they consider that if it is a Code within the Revolution, then it should not be valid”.
The president considered that the expressions towards the Code have to do with the understandings that people have in their own family or creed conditions.
“I believe that we have also assumed a position of courage by calling a referendum in the conditions that the country is going through: shortages, blackouts, shortages, with an important part of the economy paralyzed due to the intensification of the measures applied by President Trump in his mandate and maintained by the current administration of the United States.”
The first secretary of the PCC said that it has already been won, because regardless of whether the vote is yes or no, “we were all less selfish and looked more towards families and society.”
In this sense he added: “We all learned more about what our family and social realities were. Only the popular debate that has been generated and the way in which people have stopped to think about issues that at a given moment were not in their interest has already contributed to our society in terms of spirituality and feelings in relation to the family” .
Due to the depth and scope of the Family Code and the diversity of topics, the president considered that this is a monumental work. It has been subjected to two citizen participation processes, the Popular Consultation and the Referendum.
“That tells us that the country is on the way to continue expanding its military.
“That tells us that the country is on the way to continue expanding its democratic and participatory exercise, within the socialist Constitution. Each time the legal norms approved by the National Assembly of People’s Power are reached with more participation, seeking more criteria from the population”, commented the president.
In this regard, he stressed that all these laws and decree laws that are being prepared and approved, as well as public and government policies, are advised by groups of experts, so that all these regulations emerge from the outset with legal robustness, with a humanistic approach, towards socialism and from the treatment of integrality.
Miguel Díaz Canel Bermúdez, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) and President of the Republic, Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.
“My expectation is that the majority of the population will vote yes. We have to get used to the fact that on such complex issues, where there is a diversity of criteria, there are people who can give a vote of punishment, because even if they have nothing against the Code, they assume a position determined by disgust because of the complex situation they are going through. . That is also legitimate,” said the head of state.
Likewise, he said that we cannot solve the economic problems that we have and then build a legal norm like this. “If a majority vote is yes, then it takes a tremendous effort because there is a group of constructions that support everything that the Code recognizes in terms of guarantees and rights.”
Most people understand that we are growing, assured Miguel Díaz-Canel.
“When we overcome the complex situations we are going to have a Code at the society level that helps and gives guarantees. I strongly believe in the participation and wisdom of our people. In addition, we have worked with transparency and loyalty. There was a constitutional mandate and we have fulfilled it in the times agreed by the National Assembly, regardless of the complex situation in the country.”
“The Code must be read, interpreted and assumed from and with the heart, always putting oneself in the place of others. The Code breaks taboos and prejudices. The most important thing is that we have grown as a society”, concluded the Cuban president.
(By: Thalía Fuentes Puebla y Abel Padrón Padilla/Cubadebate)