(UTV|COLOMBO) – A 57-year-old bureaucrat will take Raul Castro’s place as the president of Cuba on Thursday as a government led by a single family for six decades tries to ensure the long-term survival of one of the world’s last communist states.
Members of the National Assembly voted Wednesday on Miguel Mario Diaz-Canel Bermudez’s nomination as the sole candidate for president. The result won’t be officially announced until Thursday morning but it’s already clear because the assembly approves all executive branch proposals by margins of 95 percent or higher.
The 86-year-old Castro will remain head of the Communist Party, which is designated by the constitution as “the superior guiding force of society and the state.” As a result, he will still be the most powerful person in Cuba for the time being.
His departure from the presidency is nonetheless a symbolically charged moment for a country that has been under the absolute rule of one family since the revolution — first by revolutionary leader Fidel Castro and, for the last decade, his younger brother.
Facing biological reality but still active and apparently healthy, Raul Castro is stepping down as president in an effort to guarantee that new leaders can maintain the government’s grip on power in the face of economic stagnation, an aging population and increasing disenchantment among younger generations.
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