• Submitted by: manso
• Society
• 05 / 02 / 2011

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The Post Newspapers Zambia.By Larry Moonze in Havana, Cuba on Monday 02 May 2011, 09:10:00 CAT (253 Reads) CTC general secretary Valdes Mesa and First Vice-President Jose Ramon Machado Ventura CTC general secretary Valdes Mesa and First Vice-President Jose Ramon Machado Ventura.

Post Online, Havana: CUBAN Workers Confederation (CTC) general secretary Salvador Valdes Mesa has said the workers are in full charge of the economic reforms underway in Cuba.

Meanwhile, Cuban President Raul Castro presided the May Day festivities in the eastern province of Santiago de Cuba leaving his First Vice-President Jose Ramon Machado Ventura to lead the parade in the capital Havana.

Addressing the Labour Day parade at Havana's Jose Marti Revolution Plaza on Sunday, Valdes Mesa asked Cuban workers unite in diversity and with discipline take their role in the ongoing economic reforms.

"March for everything that unites and uplifts us" for the nation, Fidel, Raul,for the party, the revolution and socialism," he said. "For social justice and progress for all of us and of humanity. Let us take our fate as Martí wished along with the poor of the earth and change in the furnace of work the world of today and tomorrow."

Valdes Mesa said throughout Cuba the people had ratified socialism as the only option for the country.

"Millions of Cubans celebrate May Day today with renewed joy and excitement on the successful hosting of the sixth party Communist Party of Cuba congress which has paved the way for carrying out the updating of our economic model," he said.

"We do it because we support the decisions of the party congress and the guidelines of the economic and social policy of the revolution in which discussion and enrichment hundreds of thousands of our views and suggestions were taken into account in yet another way to demonstrate our genuine revolutionary democracy."

Valdes Mesa paid tribute to the fallen heroes in the struggles for independence and in defence of the country over several centuries.

"And in particular a tribute to the heroes and heroines who made us this year commemorate the 50th anniversary of the proclamation of the socialist character of the revolution and the victory of Playa Giron Bay of Pigs," he said.

Valdes Mesa also said this May Day, Cubans celebrated another 50 years of the literacy campaign that had made every Cuban worker able to read and write.

"That literacy campaign is a great feat, a premise which put us on track to be free," he said. "Thanks to that today the workers and the union movement are not mere observers of the changes but are active participants in them. We know our role in the economic model updating and refinement of our society. That is to be more efficient, productive, rational in spending, and more and we can meet the needs of all our people."

Valdes Mesa said unity remained the strategic weapon of the revolution adding that "unity does not deny differences of opinion."

He said unity was today more necessary than ever now that many new self-employed workers had been added to the Cuban labourforce.

Valdes Mesa said it was the diversity among the CTC ranks that had strengthened the tens of thousands of unionized state workers in Cuba.

He thanked the over 1,500 trade union delegates from 63 countries that attended the parade in Havana. Valdes Mesa demanded the US to free the five Cuban "antiterrorists unjustly incarcerated in US prisons."

On the other hand Vice-President Machado Ventura joined Valdes Mesa in waving at marchers in a procession that lasted close to two hours.

Also present were leaders of the Communist Party of Cuba, government and state,the Union of Young Communists and social and mass organizations including Russian Federation Duma vice-president Ivan Melnikov.

Meanwhile, President Castro this year skipped the capital parade to join his fellow easterners in Santiago de Cuba.

The "patriotic march" presided by President Castro took place at the Antonio Maceo Revolution Square.

As is his tradition, President Castro did not address the workers leaving it to Maria de los Angeles Cordero the CTC provincial general secretary who urged all workers to be united and contribute to building a better world for Cuba and the rest of the world. The members of the Association of Combatants of the Cuban Revolution, followed by students from educational institutions marched in front of the 24 blocs.

Source: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews/message/123697