HAVANA (HRNW) – Cuba said on Monday that voters over the weekend had elected all 470 candidates for the National Assembly, in elections in which there were no opposition candidates.
Election officials said Monday that the initial turnout was 75.92%, topping participation in municipal elections in November and a referendum on the Cuban family code, which legalized gay marriage, in September.
“We want to thank our people…for participating in a massive way in this electoral process of transcendental importance for the present and the future of the nation,” Alina Balseiro, president of Cuba´s National Electoral Council, said on state-run TV.
Participation in Sunday’s election was widely seen by both pro- and anti-government groups as a proxy for gauging support for Cuba’s communist leadership at a time of deep economic crisis and growing social unrest.
Though three of every four Cubans voted Sunday, that rate was still nearly 10 percentage points below participation in 2018 legislative elections and well below all previous elections under late President Fidel Castro, when nearly every Cuban of voting age typically cast a ballot.