Raul Castro names rival to cabinet

Posted on Fri, Sep. 01, 2006

CUBA
Raúl Castro names rival to cabinet
Havana mades its first cabinet change since Raúl Castro took over
leadership from his brother.
BY NANCY SAN MARTIN
nsanmartin@MiamiHerald.com

In the first Cuban government change since Raúl Castro began ruling the
island a month ago, a well-known hardliner and reputed rival was named
minister of communications and information science.

The appointment of Ramiro Valdés Thursday was viewed by most
Cuba-watchers as significant because of his perceived rivalry with Fidel
Castro's brother, and because it gives him control of the flow of
information in and out of the island.

''Better to keep your enemies closer than your friends,'' said Andy
Gomez of the University of Miami's Institute for Cuban and
Cuban-American Studies.

Raúl Castro, 75, was made provisional leader on July 31 after his older
brother Fidel underwent surgery for a still undisclosed ailment.

Valdés, now about 74, was with the Castro brothers during the failed
attack on the Moncada army barracks in 1953 now marked as the start of
the revolution. He was jailed with them and later joined their guerrilla
group that toppled dictator Fulgencio Batista. But for more than two
decades, Raúl Castro and Valdés ran rival power centers -- Castro, the
well-respected armed forces and Valdés, the feared Interior Ministry, in
charge of domestic security.

CLASHED OFTEN

The two are reported to have clashed often and in 1985, Valdés was
dismissed as minister and member of the Cuban Communist Party's ruling
Political Buro, and faded away from the public spotlight. No official
reason for his dismissal was ever given.

One brief biography says he was a founder of the Communist Party and
member of its Central Committee since 1965. He served in the legislative
National Assembly since 1976 and sat on its 31-member Council of State
-- its powerful standing committee -- until 1997 and was reelected in 2003.

During Cuba's opening to foreign investments in the mid-1990s, he was
named head of the Grupo de Electrónica, a government agency that deals
in computers and works closely with Italian and Chinese companies
providing Cuba with telecommunication and technology services.

Valdés' appointment came at a time when the government is cracking down
on illegal satellite TV antennas that receive foreign broadcasts, such
as Univisión and the U.S.-funded TV Martí.

''Now [Valdés] can directly confront ideology. He can control and
repress the flow of information,'' said Eugenio Yáñez, an economics
professor who worked closely with top military officials in the 1990s
and now lives in Miami.

The appointment, experts said, also may point to a third and more subtle
significance: Cuba's increasing economic ties to China.

Valdés has made several trips to China, including one in which he
accompanied Raúl Castro. The younger Castro is believed to look
positively on Beijing's system of an open economy with tight political
controls.

NEW AMBASSADOR

On Aug. 25, Havana announced the appointment of a new ambassador to
China, Carlos Miguel Pereira, long viewed as the right-hand man to
Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque.

''Raúl is trying to emphasize that [both hardliners and reformers] have
a stake in the future of the country,'' said Frank Mora, a professor at
the National War College in Washington.

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