Previously, a broad popular consultation process was developed, where 6,481,200 voters participated with 336,595 interventions in more than 79,000 meetings, which led to changes to 49.15% of the content of the project.

In general, the Family Code:

It seeks to recognize and protect vulnerable sectors of society.
There is an intentional treatment against discrimination and violence in the family space.
Recognizes the rights of older adults.
It incorporates the possibility of solidary gestation.
Transformation of a system of authority to one of responsibility in the relationship between mothers and fathers with their children.
It develops the right of all people to found a family and marry.
Family caregivers are named and recognized.

The new proposal of the family substantive text has as background Law No. 1289 of February 14, 1975, Family Code, modified in several of its precepts, essentially by Law No. 51, of July 15, 1985, of the Registry of Civil Status and Decree-Law No. 76 of January 20, 1984.

The project seeks to guarantee the rights of all people, regardless of the structure or form of organization they have opted for when forming a family, so that values ​​such as mutual respect, loyalty, solidarity, assistance reciprocal, as well as the affection between its members so that the family does not cease to be a moral entity, of a plural nature that has a single objective: to make those who compose it happy. It is about designing a normative body tailored to the Cuban society of these times.

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)

The new proposal of the family substantive text has as background Law No. 1289 of February 14, 1975, Family Code, modified in several of its precepts, essentially by Law No. 51, of July 15, 1985, of the Registry of Civil Status and Decree-Law No. 76 of January 20, 1984. Aware of the changes, needs, expectations and realities of the contemporary Cuban family, the 2019 Constitution of the Republic introduced a series of principles that have radically transformed the traditional criterion that of this important social group has prevailed for too long and of its rights as an institution, as well as those that correspond to each of its members, based on the value-principle of dignity that it enshrines as the essence of the rights of the person, which is nothing more than to say that the person has a value in itself, independent of any circumstance or internal or external quality; and it is particularly linked to the free development of the personality and the protection of family life without biases of inequality, all principles also enshrined in the constitutional text.

The recognition of the equality of all people before the law implies the same protection in the enjoyment of rights, freedoms and opportunities, without any discrimination due to any personal condition or circumstance that implies a distinction harmful to human dignity. Transferred to the family level, it means, among many manifestations, the right of all people to marry and found a family, to organize it in the way that their convictions dictate, to access all the institutions that are protected in the family space, to Balanced use of time that allows them to fully develop without domestic and care overloads and co-responsibility in the tasks of caring for the children and those that the rest of the members need in the different stages of their lives.

The right to free development of the personality protects the option that each person chooses the construction of their life project, that they decide the meaning of their own existence, according to their values, ideas, expectations and tastes. Taken to the level of the family, it supports the abolition of the requirement of heterosexuality to access figures protected by law such as marriage, de facto affective unions, adoption or motherhood and fatherhood through the use of assisted reproduction techniques; justifies the presence of divorces without requiring the need to air a reason for guilt, but rather that the will of the person is sufficient when they no longer wish to remain linked to their spouse, and the possibility of agreeing on the economic life of the couple, for only mention some examples of the concrete expression of that principle.

The Constitution dedicates the Third Chapter of Title V to the Families in its articles from 81 to 89. This location in the system of the First Law is not accidental nor is it meaningless; The protection of the family must be seen from the vision of protection of rights. The legal norm dedicated to its protection cannot be less. The approval of a Family Code in Cuba becomes an urgent need, felt and dreamed of by many based on regulations conceived with a deep ethical sense, with a vocation for plurality and inclusion, erected from affection, on the basis of respect to the difference and visibility of the most vulnerable sectors in the family order.

The project seeks to guarantee the rights of all people, regardless of the structure or form of organization they have opted for when forming a family, so that values ​​such as mutual respect, loyalty, solidarity, assistance reciprocal, as well as the affection between its members so that the family does not cease to be a moral entity, of a plural nature that has a single objective: make those who compose it happy. It is about designing a normative body tailored to the Cuban society of these times.

The text that will finally be taken to a referendum is divided into 11 titles, 474 articles, 5 transitory provisions and 44 final provisions, and its main aspects are consolidated, namely:

-Affection and solidarity are reinforced as the platforms and axes on which family relationships revolve. The project looks at families as a union of people linked by an affective, psychological, sentimental bond that are forced to a communion of life, so that they support each other. Thus, affection wins and is established as a legal value.

-There is an intentional treatment of discrimination and violence in the family space, with palpable legal effects in each circumstance in which it occurs and the possibility of its being denounced by any person who has knowledge of these facts.

-It seeks to recognize and protect the rights of vulnerable sectors of society that have often gone unnoticed in the eyes of the legislator; people who in the family space could be in some circumstance that places them in any situation of disadvantage and that usually concentrates on children and adolescents, people who are victims of violence, older adults, or people with disabilities. In the last two cases, a special title is dedicated to their rights to family life, autonomous and independent, free of violence, to choose a place of residence, to an accessible environment, to self-regulation of future protection, to participation and inclusion. social and family, family communication and support respectful of their preferences is an achievement of the new standard that is proposed.

-The rights of older adults are recognized, with special mention to grandfathers and grandmothers, who have transmitted values, traditions, customs, have forged family identity and have been architects of the work of caring for the younger generations, as an expression of high values, of loyalty, of respect for those who have preceded us. It is a debt that family law settles with them.

-Girls, boys and adolescents are treated as subjects of rights, with the possibility of exercising them, either by themselves or through their fathers, mothers and guardians, but in any case, based on respect for their individuality, to their progressive development, as they are people in formation, which does nothing more than respect the postulates of the Convention on the Rights of the Child that Cuba has signed. This seeks to promote decision-making, the assumption of responsibilities, the exercise of their rights and the demand for duties to the extent that they can form their own judgment.

-Kinship is transformed, firstly, because the sources of filiation are also transformed and secondly because kinship by affinity is strengthened. To the affiliation by consanguinity and by adoption, we add the one that has as its source the use of an assisted reproduction technique and the one that has its origin in socio-affectiveness. Kinship by affinity will not only depend on marriage but also on de facto affective unions and the legal regime of related mothers/fathers/grandparents/sons/daughters is structured. (stepmothers and stepfathers)

-The exercise of the freedom of family members to agree on different situations is allowed: mothers and fathers to agree on the distribution of custody and care of their sons and daughters, which includes the possibility of sharing them in harmony with the principles of co-responsibility and co-parenting; to the spouses to agree on the economic regime of their marriage; to the members of the affective de facto union to organize their coexistence; people to agree on the solution of family conflicts outside the judicial space through mediation or conciliation; mothers and fathers to reach agreements in the order of the surnames that their daughters and sons will bear.

-The right/duty of communication is reinforced, not only between mothers and fathers with their minor sons and daughters, but it also reaches the entire family group with a special look at the mechanisms of its guarantee in people with disabilities.

-There is a transition from a system of authority to a system of responsibility in the relationship between mothers and fathers towards their children, which, far from being weakened, enhances and reinforces the powers of legal representation and administration of their children’s assets, their rights and the duty to have them with them, take care of them, offer them love, emotional stability, educate them without violence, respect their own characteristics taking into account their growth and gradual development.

-The economic value of work in the home and greater economic and patrimonial protection are reinforced for those who have dedicated themselves to domestic and care work.
Figures of protection and friendly support are developed with the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities such as de facto guardians, foster care, guardianship only for minors or voluntary food.

-Care is recognized as a right and family caregivers are named and recognized, based on the protection of their rights when they fully or partially assume responsibility for the care of another person who is part of their family. It is about achieving a balance, on the one hand, the right that every person has to care and, on the other hand, that of someone who, renouncing many of their personal and professional projects, dedicates themselves to the care of their relatives.

-It is worth noting the projected reform, still superficial, of the Civil Code that also reacts to two fundamental elements, which are not the only ones:
The transformation of the legal regime of legal capacity regulated in the Civil Code, consistent with the paradigms of effective participation, social and family inclusion, physical and cognitive accessibility.
Concrete responses to this scourge of family violence.

Finally, the look at families must be in the plural, from their denomination and this has a symbolic value in the language of the family legislator, respecting the language used by the constituent and the various family realities.

In the drafting of the proposed text, the discourse has been taken care of, not only in a rational sense from the inclusive but from the use of terminology in some institutions of family law, appropriate to the social changes that are proposed as a transmitter of values. . That is why expressions such as “patria potestad” convey to us the representation of a society with a typical patriarchal family model, which has been replaced today by an idea of ​​a family in which equality prevails and emphasizes the responsibility with which the rights and duties established for the protection of the child must be exercised.

The important thing is to accompany the reference to their condition as a person and promote the replacement of these expressions, which aim more to emphasize immaturity or incapacity or diminution or deficiency, than in the potentiality of the person.

Likewise, views have been taken advantage of not only from Law but also from related sciences such as Psychology, Sociology, Medicine, Demography, Pedagogy, Statistics, among others, but not with a compassionate or merely tolerant vision of the new family models, but with a vocation for ecumenism that the constitutional plural exalts.

Between September 29 and October 15, 2021, the Specialized Consultation process was carried out and between the months of February and April of the current year, the Popular Consultation process was carried out. The results were announced by the National Electoral Council on May 15, 2022: more than 61.96% of the participants in the popular consultation expressed themselves in favor of the entire text.

The final text that will be submitted for the ratification of the Sovereign is the sum of all the criteria provided by specialists and by the people in the neighborhood assemblies and in the discussions in the workplaces, universities, and other student centers, analyzed exhaustively and punctually. and taken into account except those that cause a manifest inconsistency with the rights enshrined in the Constitution and the international treaties to which Cuba is a party.

These are, in essence, those that imply limiting the access of all people to all the institutions that the text protects with special emphasis on marriage, to constitute an affective de facto union, to the adoption or use of reproduction techniques assisted that violates the rights to found a family, whatever its form of organization and maternity and paternity; or to eliminate the positive notion of upbringing without violence, or the notion of the relationship of mothers and fathers with their children based on responsibility, or the references to the progressive autonomy of children and adolescents that contradicts the Convention of the Rights of the Child, its Observations and Recommendations.

A quick look at the main modifications incorporated allows us to summarize them in the following:

The WHEREAS are expanded as a text in which the reasons for which it is written are explained and the objectives it intends to achieve are explained based on the transformations that have occurred in the family and Cuban society that justify a change in the norm and exalt the role played by all in the conception of it.

The right to care and the effective protection that those who assume such a noble task deserve is expressly recognized, based on the recognition of care as the foundation for the development of humanity and the sustainability of societies, which implies its social valorization and its fair distribution. and allows promoting the implementation of positive action measures that guarantee the full enjoyment and its effective fulfillment and the real equality of opportunities and treatment.

The protection of children and adolescents is extended to exceptional and disaster situations: It is part of the action of the Cuban State that is only reinforced with the explicit recognition in the family norm. Recently, the guarantee of this right was verified as a result of the accident at the Hotel Saratoga in Havana; All the children had their health and education guaranteed immediately after the catastrophe.

The principle of the best interest of girls, boys and adolescents and their assessment guidelines are intertwined with the duties that assist them: their recognition as subjects of rights implies that they are also holders of duties. Especially respecting their relatives, participating and taking joint responsibility for the care of the home and the performance of domestic tasks according to their age and regardless of their gender.

Urgent protection against discrimination and violence is reinforced and the possibility of filing a complaint is extended to anyone who knows about these facts, beyond protection in the judicial sphere.

Clarity in the definition of solidarity gestation is improved, its distinction with the assumptions that generate multiparenthood, a term is established to start the process and the figure is further shielded.

Rules of personal content of the exercise of parental responsibility and those that link the consent of both holders of parental responsibility are outlined, for example, for departures from the national territory and its impact on the eventual abduction or retention of children and adolescents. .

The option of recording in a notarial deed the delegation of part of the exercise of parental responsibility and guardianship and care in favor of third parties is incorporated: if the agreements of the members of the families are respected and these do not undermine the interest above, the option of assuming these agreements by writing is enabled.

The Family Code is one of the most important norms for the social life of the nation. It breaks the traditional paradigms on which it has been based to build a more democratic Law, as well as supportive and responsible; extends its protective mantle to all people, by multiplying affections and adding rights.

It is, in short, a norm that responds to the principles and dictates of the Cuban Constitution of 2019 and, like it, is inclusive, pluralistic, insofar as it strengthens the meaning and search for fulfillment of the person, of their happiness. , from the recognition of dignity as the supreme value and foundation of the rest of the constitutional rights recognized in it.

(By: Dr. Ana María Álvarez Tabío. Posted in: Think Right)

These, among other premises, led to the passing on May 22 of a policy to overhaul the animal health system, reports Dr. Yobani Gutiérrez Ravelo, director of Animal Health at the Ministry of Agriculture (Minag). The new policy is in line with Guideline 167 of the Economic and Social Policy of the Party and the Revolution for the 2016-2021 period, and it defines nine principles in line with the current context in Cuba and with international standards.

“The first goal is to create a National Center for Animal Health (Cenasa). This organization will be under Minag; it will lead the activities throughout the entire chain of terrestrial and aquatic animals and it will have offices in all the agriculture delegations,” he explains.

Dr. Cristóbal Arredondo Alfonso, deputy director of Animal Health, says that the new policy maintains the assistance service in the business system and the agricultural cooperatives. He ratifies that they will be supported by the institutions and organizations to which these basic enterprise units (UEB) belong to ensure the development of veterinary assistance and of reproduction, and to strengthen the primary healthcare in the network of veterinary consultation offices and clinics.

In order for the animal health to work efficiently, it is important to overhaul the main animal health main laboratories (ULCSA), composed of five animal health laboratories and one of vegetable health. The plan is that all the laboratories, animal and vegetable health and seeds, are grouped under this organization.

One of the decisions approved is the creation of a National Network of Veterinary Drugstores for the retail sale of products used in the veterinary exercise. Gutiérrez Ravelo explains that Labiofam, the business group in charge of the production and commercialization of this kind of medicines, will create this network that will initially reach the provincial administrative centers and then extend to the rest of the municipalities.

Moreover, this policy also sets out that the businesses that produce, process and commercialize food of animal origin are responsible for the quality and safety of their products, with in-house veterinaries present at the points of permanent inspection.

Among the new decisions, Arredondo Alfonso explains, it was ratified the permanence of the Cuban Association of Veterinary Medicine, which had replaced the previous Veterinary Scientific Council. The rules and statutes, goals, scope and purposes, as well as their assets and functions, would go under review to consolidate the management of knowledge.

It was also suggested to include in the annual economic plan the funding for the development of animal health; and the development of Labiofam for the production, import and commercialization of medicines and other veterinary products. Likewise, it will be taken into consideration the resources required by the Stockbreeder, Agricultural and Agroforest Groups and the improvement of the existing study material on agriculture in polytechnic schools and universities.

It is also fundamental to improve the mechanisms for the admission to the schools of Veterinary Medicine, the upgrade of the curricula and the formation of specialists in postgraduate education.

Establishing an accurate monitoring of the real situation of Veterinary Medicine is vital to better meet the demands for the specialty. For that reason, there are plans to create a public registry of veterinary doctors to shed light on the current situation of this profession and to validate the practice of those registered.

In the opinion of Mayra Cruz Legón MSc, director of the Department of Agricultural Policy at MINAG’s Legal Department, the new rules published in the Ordinary Official Gazette No. 11 of this year, implement the complementary provisions of the Decree-Law No. 137 on Veterinary Medicine, issued in 1993 (text in Spanish).

This decree-law never had regulations and thus, the Resolution No. 537 of 2020 was passed by Minag to implement those rules, comprising all the rules approved throughout the years in one legal body, now suited to the national context and the international standards.

Another regulation contained in this set is the Decree No. 20 of 2020, related to the violations in Veterinary Medicine, which were managed through the Decree No. 181 of 1993 until recently and which punished such violations with very low fines. The new legislation establishes fines that range from $500.00 to $ 3,500.00 Cuban pesos to those who violate what is established there. The fines can go up to $ 7,000.00 Cuban pesos if the violation is of a more serious type. It also establishes the seizure of animals, products and the revoke of the veterinary health license.

Dr. José Antonio Hernández Rabelo, director of the Department for Food Quarantine and Safety, says that among the violations established in the document is included the introduction in the country of products of animal origin without having complied with the proper quarantine and in a unfavorable health situation, and the sacrifice of animals for their commercialization without the authorization of the Veterinary Service for the State Health Control, among many others.

Generally speaking, as Dr. Manuel Peláez Reyes, director of the Department of Epizootiology, this regulation is directed to preserve the health of animals and human beings.

Another regulation, Resolution No. 538 of November 13, 2020 of the Ministry of Agriculture, passed the Ethical Code for veterinary doctors, which did not exist until this moment and in which the set the general principles the professional exerting these profession shall abide by in any of the forms of management approved by the State.

(Taken from Granma)