The Latin American Defense Zone, located in the Cerro municipality, is home to more than 19,300 residents. It is a predominantly urban neighborhood of Havana that also faces the harsh effects of a blockade that is suffocating Cuban families, and where efforts are underway to transform the community in the economic and social spheres.
The President of the National Defense Council, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, arrived there this Friday to learn about the strategy implemented in times of peace, as a concept of the War of the Entire People.
In the meeting with the country’s leadership – in the context of the day for National Defense Day – Ramón Rivero Pérez, president of the Defense Zone, explained the characteristics of the demarcation and the special plans that are articulated to face an exceptional situation.
In his detailed address—during which he repeatedly answered questions from the Cuban president—Rivero Pérez referred to the measures adopted to protect the territory’s main economic objectives; the functioning of the Production and Defense Brigades; the preservation of internal order in the communities; the complex mission of maintaining essential services to the population, such as water supply; and the design of various methods for producing food in an urban area that has small community gardens, plots, and organic farms.
With special emphasis, the president of the Latin American Defense Zone mentioned the attention given to families living in vulnerable situations and the 150 people residing in the so-called transit community; the systematic treatment of the more than 100 beneficiaries of the Family Care System; the energy carriers located in vital places; and everything that is done in terms of solid waste collection, one of the most complex problems that this popular council presents.
It was also learned that the Community Youth Network – an initiative to carry out actions of defense, production, communication, ideological training, culture and solidarity in the territories – also reached this area of the capital city’s Cerro neighborhood.
As confirmed in the exchange with the Head of State, the inauguration of a Senior Citizens’ Home, with capacity for almost 60 people, is planned for the coming days, among other social and economic works; as well as the commissioning of two solar power plants, facilities that generate electricity from solar energy for community use.
And it was precisely to these issues, closely linked to the implementation of the most recent economic and social transformations approved in the country, that the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Party and President of the Republic referred at the close of the exchange.
Díaz-Canel highlighted that a very fast working mechanism has been established to develop the rules, analyze them and approve those that correspond in the Council of State.
In this matter, he commented on the importance of legal certainty throughout the process of implementing the transformations, as well as political assurance, which includes not only the preparation of cadres at the national level, but also detailed explanation to the workers and the entire population.
The President of the National Defense Council insisted that all Working Groups, in each Defense Zone, must be well prepared for the implementation of economic and social transformations, due to their involvement also in the measures that are updated in the defense readiness plans.
The meeting, held in one of the Defense Zones of the Cerro municipality, was also attended by members of the Political Bureau: Esteban Lazo Hernández, President of the National Assembly of People’s Power and of the Council of State; Army Corps General Álvaro López Miera, Minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces; and Army Corps General Lázaro Alberto Álvarez Casas, Minister of the Interior.
Also participating were Major General Ernest Feijóo Eiró, head of the Western Army; and the president of the Provincial Defense Council, Liván Izquierdo Alonso; as well as other authorities from Havana.
In the exchange between President Díaz-Canel and the members of the “Latin American” Defense Zone, which was held at the most “blue” sports facility in the capital and in Cuba, a certainty was ratified that minutes after the meeting concluded, Ramón Rivero Pérez, president of the Zone, reiterated to journalists: “In these difficult times, the first thing is to defend our Homeland and preserve human lives, above all.”
Source: Radio Progreso
