The Seventh Congress of the Cuban Communist Party (PCC) was inaugurated at Havana’s Convention Center, with a strategic agenda for the socio-economic development of the country in the long term.
Jose Ramon Machado Ventura, second secretary of the Central Committee of the PCC, addressed participants in the meeting to explain organizational details, and declared it officially opened.
The election of the presidency of the four working committees for the discussion of documents, the agenda and the program of the meeting will be the first actions of delegates at the meeting.
Delegates will also adopt internal regulations, voting norms and the Commissions of documentation, mandate and appeals.
Shortly after and at the time of writing this note, the Central Report began to be read in a plenary session by the First Secretary of the Cuban Communist Party, Army General Raul Castro, in the presence of delegates and guests.
Later, about a thousand participants at the meeting, elected from proposals of their grassroots organizations, will meet in four working committees, one of which will analyze the conceptualization of Cuban socialist economic and social model.
The remaining working committees will address the country’s development plan until 2030 and the implementation of the guidelines approved at the Sixth Congress of the PCC in April, 2011, in Havana.
The fourth working committee will assess the coming to fruition of the Working Goals of the PCC agreed at its First National Conference, also held at Havana’s Convention Center, in January, 2012, attended by over 800 delegates.
The latter, in the introduction of its document, points out it had the responsibility to assess objectively and critically the work of the organization and to determine with reviving willingness the necessary changes to bring it up to current circumstances.
Its draft document was discussed by all members of the Young Communists League, which expressed over one million views that changed 78 of the 96 objectives of the text.
Also taking part as delegates to the Seventh Congress of the PCC, representing Cuban society as a whole, are PCC members in internationalist missions in Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, Haiti and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.
Some 280 guests will attend the four-day meeting, including leaders of the political organization, deputies to the National Assembly of the People’s Power and representatives of agencies of the State’s Central Administration.
In addition, representatives of civil society, combatants, researchers of scientific centers, university professors, intellectuals and directors of media outlets are also taking part in the 7th Congress of the PCC.
Jose Ramon Fernandez, 92, Hero of the Republic of Cuba and founder of the PCC, is the oldest delegate, while the youngest is Idaliena Casamayor, 27, president of a People’s Council in Guantanamo province and a Deputy to the National Assembly of the People’s Power.
The First Congress of the PCC took place on December 17-22, 1975, at the Karl Marx Theater in Havana, 10 years after the setting-up of its first Central Committee. (Taken from Cuban News Agency)
