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MORE than six million Cubans have debated a Communist Party document prepared for a Party Congress in October, and while most agreed with it, some were critical and proposed changes.
The Party newspaper Granma said 6.5 million Cubans -- most adults among Cuba's 11 million residents -- took part in meetings from June to August to discuss a party document that will be a centerpiece of the Oct. 8-10 Congress.
It said the exercise was a "wide process of reflection and revolutionary reaffirmation, and in practice another plebiscite for the Revolution, unity and democracy."
It added the debate meant the document was not just for Communists but of "an entire people who enriched it and made it their own."
Granma said 90 percent of participants approved the text "without proposing changes or additions," suggesting 10 percent did propose some changes to the document.
The eight-page document, setting the tone for a Congress that will map Cuba's political and economic strategy into the next century, draws on history to argue the only viable system for the island is one-party communism.
It links patriotism with support for the system and depicts the United States, Cuba's political enemy since the 1959 revolution that brought President Fidel Castro to power, as posing a greater threat than ever to the nation's independence.
Cubans discussed the document in small party groups, workplaces and grass-roots organisations with 90 percent approval.
Some Party members faulted the document. Granma's report admitted the meetings produced some 20,000 proposals to the document including "ratifications, changes, doubts, suggestions, criticisms and disagreements."
Granma said criticism focused on specific local issues, the need to strengthen the party and the Union of Young Communists, and daily problems related to Cuba's "complex and difficult economic situation" but did not give details.
Fidel Castro has said economic reforms such as the legalisation of the dollar, the emergence of a small private sector and tourism growth have caused deep social changes. In recent years, a person's relative well-being amid the economic crisis has centred on having dollars -- a matter of luck since that often depends on having family abroad who send home cash or landing a job with foreigners.
Granma said all the proposals made during the debate would be analysed and summarised for the document's final presentation for the Congress.
The newspaper rejected criticism of the national debate in foreign media, saying there had been an "intense defamatory campaign" against the process abroad. Such a campaign was not surprising, Granma said, given the United States openly advocated a "transition to supposed democracy in Cuba" and a return to capitalism.
Granma said Congress would evaluate progress since the last Party Congress in 1991, starting from a "Central Report" to be presented by Castro, the party's first secretary, and would also produce a resolution on the economy.