Cuban President Diaz-Canel was re-elected. How will it combat the inefficiency of the system governed in a totalitarian way

President Miguel Diaz-Canel, 62, became Cuba’s president for the first time in 2018 as the first civilian leader after nearly 60 years of the Castro brothers’ hegemony, and set out on a quest for cautious economic liberalization.

His first five years in office have been marked by the worst economic crisis in three decades and a widely criticized response to historic anti-government protests that triggered a tightening of US sanctions.

The shortage of food, medicine and fuel caused his country to experience an unprecedented exodus: more than 300,000 citizens left in 2022 alone.

Diaz-Canel’s candidacy was confirmed in the National Assembly aligned with the Communist Party of Cuba, and 459 of the 462 legislators present voted for his re-election. According to Cuban law, a president cannot serve more than two successive mandates.

The president asked his cabinet “to face the obstacles and solve the inefficiencies to better control inflation and increase the supply of goods and services.” Diaz-Canel also criticized the “unacceptable bureaucracy, indifference and corruption” that he said are holding the country back in difficult times.

The reforms led by Diaz-Canel “did not mean a complete and comprehensive transition to a mixed economy” of private and public enterprises, said analyst Arturo Lopez-Levy of the Autonomous University of Madrid. Most companies in Cuba are still controlled by the state.