Party Congress Calls for Direct Election of Cuban Legislators

Cuba’s ruling Communist Party, seeking to widen democracy within its one-party system, has approved the principle of direct, individual voting in elections for the island’s legislature, the National Assembly.

The direct-vote option was the most notable political reform recommended late Saturday on the third day of a policy-making party congress in the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba.

The party meeting has been drawing up a strategy for Cuba’s economic and political survival as one of the world’s last orthodox Communist states.

Under Cuba’s current system, introduced in 1976, deputies to the National Assembly and delegates to the 14 provincial assemblies are elected by the representatives of more than 150 municipal assemblies, themselves chosen by local voters.

Under the proposed change, to be implemented in reforms to the constitution, individual voters would directly choose both delegates to their provincial assemblies and deputies to the National Assembly, which approves laws and draws up the state budget.