Cuba\u2019s first prime minister in more than four decades- long-serving tourism minister Manuel Marrero – took office Saturday as the country resurrected a post last held by Fidel Castro.<\/p>\n
The appointment of Marrero, 56, as head of government is part of a process of decentralisation and generational change from the revolutionary old guard that is aimed at extending and protecting Communist Party rule.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis proposal was duly approved by the political bureau of the Communist Party of Cuba,\u201d President Miguel Diaz-Canel said, presenting it to the country\u2019s National Assembly, which unanimously signed off.<\/p>\n
Immediately after his presentation, Marrero received a handshake from former president Raul Castro, the leader of the Communist Party.<\/p>\n
Marrero \u201cis not coming to the job to transform, but rather to implement and manage. The president is the one who leads,\u201d said Cuba specialist Arturo Lopez-Levy of Holy Names University in California.<\/p>\n
Marrero served as tourism minister from 2004, late in revolutionary hero Fidel Castro\u2019s administration, continuing in the post under Fidel\u2019s brother Raul and the current president, Diaz-Canel.<\/p>\n
He began his career in government in 1999 as vice-president of the powerful Gaviota Hotel Group belonging to the armed forces, becoming its president a year later – a post he held until 2004.<\/p>\n
\u201cThroughout his career… (Marrero) has been characterised by his modesty, honesty, work capacity, political sensitivity and loyalty to the party and the revolution,\u201d Diaz-Canel said.<\/p>\n
The new premier \u201chas led the tourism industry in a commendable fashion, which constitutes one of the main lines of development of the national economy,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
That is precisely why Marrero \u201cwho has all this wide-ranging experience in tourism and working with investors\u201d, is the pick, according to Lopez-Levy.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt underscores the priority that this area holds in the country\u2019s development strategy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The position of prime minister was last held by Fidel Castro in 1976. _Agencies<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Cuba\u2019s first prime minister in more than four decades- long-serving tourism minister Manuel Marrero – took office Saturday as the country resurrected a post last held by Fidel Castro. The appointment of Marrero, 56, as head of government is part of a process of decentralisation and generational change from the revolutionary old guard that is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2699,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2698"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2698"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2698\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2700,"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2698\/revisions\/2700"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2699"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonotarsomoy.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}