Life after Castro. What will happen in Cuba? That is the prevalent question being asked by people in Santiago de Cuba, in Miami, Fla, in Nassau, Bahamas and in many cities and countries around the world. Fidel Castro has been in power and the president of Cuba for longer than many people asking the questions have been alive and he is the only power broker in Cuba they know.

Castro’s power was taking hold in Cuba just about the time John F Kennedy was taking over the presidency of the United States ö following the 1959 Cuban revolution and the US presidential elections ö and 46 years later he is still being railed against and threatened by the US Government. He has survived the administrations of eight American presidents and has outlived three of those who would have wished to take him out: Kennedy, Lynden Johnson and Richard Nixon.

But at long last, the end of Castro’s days might indeed be numbered, although he has been reported dead many times over the years and even more often since the July abdominal surgery, which led to him handing over power temporarily to his brother Raul Castro, and which has kept him from public view except for a few photographs in which Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez also appeared. He was missing from the Dec 2 official celebrations to mark his 80th birthday.

In South Florida the authorities expect radical changes and are bracing for massive migration numbers from Cuba, similar to that of the 1980s Mariel Boat Lift, when tens of thousands of Cubans took to the seas in whatever could float in efforts to escape the island.

On Friday the largest US congressional delegation to visit the island arrived for three days of talks with government leaders, foreign diplomats and others, in what some hope could be a first step toward normalizing relations with Cuba.

The 10-member bipartisan delegation was led by Representatives William Delahunt, (D-Mass.) and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) who have criticized the four-decade economic embargo against Cuba.

“We sense this is an important time, and we hope to be able to meet with officials here and others and hopefully launch a new era in US-Cuba relations,” Saturday’s Sun Sentinel reported Flake as saying Friday afternoon, as the group arrived at the Hotel Nacional.

Earlier this year a report released by the US Presidential Commission for Assistance to a free Cuba, indicated that $80 million would be available to help pro-democracy leaders after the demise of Castro. The US does not favor a planned succession from Fidel to 75-year-old Raul.

According to the most recent Gallup Poll, 67 per cent of a targeted group of Americans favored the re-establishment of diplomatic relations with the communist Island while 27 per cent opposed the move. The Gallup News service says that over the past 32 years, a majority of Americans have consistently said they support establishing diplomatic ties with Cuba, with the exception of one poll conducted in 1996.

The Bahamas solidified its diplomatic ties with Cuba in July, opening an Embassy in Havana with Carlton Wright as the Ambassador. At the time Foreign Minister Fred Mitchell said that there is considerable demand for consular and diplomatic services and that the embassy is expected to meet that demand.

Cuba’s presence in The Bahamas was also upgraded from Consulate to Embassy with former Consul General Felix Wilson being named to the post of Ambassador.

Courtesy of The Nassau Guardian

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