Cuba in future will be a country that promotes foreign investment, expands the private sector and dutifully pays off its debts, according to a proposal revealed on Monday by the ruling Communist party. But it will not renounce the socialist system installed half a century ago after Fidel Castro took power in a 1959 revolution, according to the 32-page document that will guide debates at a Communist party congress in April.
"The economic policy in the new phase will correspond with the principle that only socialism is capable of overcoming difficulties and preserving the gains of the revolution, and that in the updating of the economic model, planning will be paramount, not the market." it said.
The document, entitled "Guidelines of Economic and Social Policy," is the program of reforms President Raul Castro will place before the party congress for its consideration. They could be modified during extensive public discussions ahead of the congress, which was announced by the president on Monday night and will be the first since 1997.
The congress is where Cuba's only legal political party sets direction for the country, supposedly for the next five years, although it will have been 14 years since the last meeting. The April gathering will be particularly important because, given the age of current leadership, it will be the last for the generation that fought the revolution and has held power since then, hewing hard to communist ideology.
President Castro, 79, took office in 2008 after older brother Fidel Castro, 84, ruled the island for 49 years and finally resigned due to ill health. He promised to improve the daily lives of Cubans and has focused on economic improvement, including major reforms announced in September to cut a million government jobs and expand the private sector by granting 250,000 new licenses for self-employment.