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Talk:Elections in Cuba

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Adam Carr (talk | contribs) at 09:11, 5 May 2006. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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Archive 01

Since I have rewritten the article all this old Talk can be archived. Adam 00:08, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

Good job on the re-write Adam. --Zleitzen 00:41, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

Voting for a list of candidates

I don't think the part about the single-member electorates, or the part about there only being one candidate on the ballot paper is true. As far as I know, each ballot paper covers several seats, and people must accept or reject each candidate on the list (one candidate per seat). There is an "all of the above" box allowing people to accept all the candidates. It is impossible to reject all the candidates, since there is no "none of the above" box, and ticking none of the boxes means leaving the ballot paper blank, which can't be distinguished from an informal vote. I'll have to research this more, unless someone else wants to clear this up. Carl Kenner 05:06, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

I've done some more research, and it definately appears that there are between 2 and 5 seats in each electorate (with one candidate per seat). This means voters have a ballot paper with 2-5 names on it and they have to tick which candidates they are prepared to accept, or tick "all of the above". It is definately not a single-member electorate system. See Final Results of the elections of People's Power - Our Deputies. So I'm going to edit the article to reflect this. Carl Kenner 12:40, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

That's very interesting, I haven't seen that fact noted anywhere before. They are called circumscriptions, by the way, not electorates. This is a similar system to Singapore, which also has multi-member, but non-proportional, electoral districts. (Of course proportional or non-proportional makes no difference when no-one else is allowed to contest the elections!) Adam 13:08, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

It's quite well publicised. Fidel Castro is always calling on voters to tick the all-of-the-above box rather than ticking the several candidates individually. Supposedly it is "counter-revolutionary" to make up your mind about each one! Bizarre. Electoral districts with the same ballot paper are called "electorates" in Australia. I've never heard of "circumscriptions". I'm not sure why some electorates have 5 seats and some only have 2. I think it is one seat per 20,000 voters, and the districts are probably whatever is easiest geographically. Carl Kenner 08:35, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Removal of Section

I've removed a section detailing Cuba's 2003 elections. This needs a lot of re-working before re-inclusion. Some of the associated commentary was unencylopedic, and the results themselves were inaccurately presented, as I mentioned in my edit summary. --Zleitzen 22:54, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Where did you move it to for re-working? The father's name is "Juan Miguel Gonzalez". The section is cited and seems to meet WP:V. Hard statistic about protest voting in elections is relevant, I think. The bad wording could be corrected through editing rather than be summarily deleted. If the Misplaced Pages consensus is that citing sources from Cuba about Cuba are not allowed, perhaps that needs some discussion? BruceHallman 00:09, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
It's here Bruce, I don't understand the title, and a lot of the commentary. Even the election results were unclear "The weatherman"? It needs a lot of clarification. It would be best to deal with that before reintroduction. --Zleitzen 00:26, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
I've fixed the style now that I know how to do tables :-) So cut out the vandalism. The Cuba page said the Election page contained election results, but it didn't, so I added them. If you don't like the Election results then move to Cuba and vote. I think I covered the opposition case fairly thoroughly, rather than just presenting the votes without mentioning the boycott calls or factoring them in. If you don't like the style, or clarity of an article the correct approach is to fix it, or tag the section with a style and clarity heading. Don't just delete other people's hard work. Anyway, it's fixed now. Carl Kenner 08:24, 5 May 2006 (UTC)


2003 election

Who is "the weatherman"?--Zleitzen 02:10, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Some of the old Weathermen from the 60s still hiding out in Cuba? Maybe Bruce is one of them. Adam 02:27, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Adam, why do you keep taking jabs at me? BruceHallman 03:03, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

The weatherman, Dr. Jose Rubiera, is one of the Cuban deputies to the National Assembly who has been in the international media frequently, particularly in the wake of hurricane Katrina. He is responsible for Cuba's award-winning hurricane preparedness and disaster relief program. He is also said to be one of the few people who stands up to Fidel Castro when he is wrong. He is much more popular than the US head of FEMA, as you can see. Carl Kenner 08:47, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, I gave Bruce an honest and direct answer to his question, but I see it has been deleted. Obviously we have a Granma subeditor at work here. Adam 09:11, 5 May 2006 (UTC)