Several Cuban activists are being threatened by State Security with being arrested if they persist in their intention to be observers of the electoral process on Sunday, March 26, when the approval of the candidacies for deputies of the National Assembly of People’s Power will be put to the vote. (ANPP), denounced this Monday Zelandia de la Caridad Pérez, national coordinator of the Cuban Electoral Defense Commission (Cocude).
In a telephone conversation with 14ymedioDe la Caridad Pérez affirmed that for several days, the political police have been making this type of threat and also affirms that “those who are campaigning for abstention are being repressed very strongly, alluding to the recently approved Penal Code.”
“A number of citizens and activists who encourage and participate in a campaign for abstention are being threatened with legal proceedings for alleged violation of the law,” Cocude and the Observers of Electoral Rights and Citizens collectives said in a joint statement on Monday. Observers of Electoral Processes.
The activists pointed out that the electoral law does not prohibit citizens from “expressing their preferences”, although they do carry out a formal electoral campaign.
“Those who are campaigning for abstention are being repressed very strongly, alluding to the recently approved Penal Code”
“The right to observation is enshrined in the current electoral Law, so that this repressive action and the operations that State Security is carrying out against the activists interested in exercising that right is a clear violation of the Law,” the activist insisted. , who added: “We have received reports of these threats from Santiago de Cuba, Artemisa and especially from here in the capital.”
These threats, insists De la Caridad Pérez, contrast with the statements by Alina Balseiro Gutiérrez, president of the National Electoral Council, “who has called on the entire population to participate in next Sunday’s scrutiny. The only conclusion is that they They don’t want our reports, which are serious and documented, to give the lie to their propaganda.”
“One of the things that we are going to audit is that, in the polling stations, when the process is concluded, information with the results is posted. This is a step that they often violate, as they also violate the time in advance with which the electoral roll of each school should be posted in public places,” explained the coordinator of Cocude.
For their part, Electoral Rights Observers (ODE) denounced on their Facebook page that during the dynamic test this Sunday with a view to the voting on March 26, there was no “access to independent national and/or international actors” so that they could participate and “audit the process.”
“One of the things that we are going to audit is that, in the polling stations, when the process is concluded, information with the results is posted”
“In fact, in all the previous processes, as well as in the current one, the will of the regime to prevent any exercise of independent citizen monitoring that exposes the multiple irregularities of the process has been made clear,” the organization stated.
From the dynamic test, ODE reported that it visited ten schools in Havana and Holguín and verified that “there is no precise information” on how the process is carried out, “what are the evaluation criteria” or “how the personnel that intervenes in the the process”.
“In general, it was another sign of the secrecy with which the electoral processes are carried out in Cuba, as well as the lack of participation of those who had to attend. Independent citizens in different locations reported that there were many voting centers in the that the test was not carried out, and that they were not even open,” ODE concluded, but not before specifying that in some centers there was strong police security, State Security agents and the presence of local authorities.
In the parliamentary elections next Sunday, more than eight million Cubans are called to the polls to vote, 1.5 million of them in the capital.
A total of 470 candidates are running for an equal number of positions in the unicameral Cuban Legislative Assembly and voters may or may not support them. Only those with the support of more than 50% of the votes cast will be able to occupy their seat. There are various legal provisions to fill those positions that may become vacant.
The candidates were selected by the so-called mass organizations, associations in the orbit of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC, the only legal one), and approved for the municipal assemblies of Popular Power, where its militants are the majority.
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