Havana – Fidel Castro, forced by illness to temporarily transfer power to his younger brother, said Tuesday in a written message to the Cuban people that his condition is “stable” after undergoing surgery to stop intestinal bleeding.
“I can say that it is a stable situation, but a real evolution requires the passage of time,” the longtime leader said in a communique read by on state-run television. “The most that could be said is that the situation will remain stable before being able to give a verdict.”
“In spirit, I am perfectly fine. The important thing is that everything in the country is going, and will continue to go, perfectly well. The country is prepared for its defense with the revolutionary armed forces and with the people,” the message continued.
“Our compatriots will know everything in due time, as happened with my fall,” Castro said, referring to an October 2004 episode in which he fractured a kneecap and broke his right arm.
In the wake of that mishap, he provided the public with details of his treatment and rehabilitation.
Castro’s message was read aloud on state television’s flagship news program, “Mesa Redonda” (Round Table), which was supposed to focus on the implications of the temporary transfer of power.
That move was announced in an earlier communique, supposedly written by Castro himself, issued late Monday explaining the delegation of power.
About to turn 80, Castro handed over his posts on a temporary basis to his younger brother Raul, the No. 2 man in the regime.
It was the first time the Communist leader has taken the step of relinquishing the reins of state, the party and the armed forces.
Raul, 75, is the island nation’s minister of defense, and has been designated to succeed his brother at the helm in the event Fidel dies or becomes incapacitated.
Earlier Tuesday, in the first public comments by a senior official since the announcement of the “provisional” elevation of Raul Castro to acting president, parliament speaker Ricardo Alarcon said Cuba’s longtime leader briefed his subordinates on their duties prior to beginning the period of rest prescribed by his doctors.
The arrangements of the temporary transfer of power “are things anticipated and decided on by someone who was fully conscious and in a condition to adopt those resolutions,” Alarcon told the official Prensa Latina news agency.
Fidel, he said, “will always battle to the final moment, but that final moment is very far away.”
“We have to exert ourselves in our work to be at the level of that youngster of 80 who, after a delicate operation and needful of rest, oversees every last detail and takes measures to confront any enemy aggression,” Alarcon said.
He described as “vomit-inducing” the images from Miami showing Cuban exiles celebrating what they see as a sign of Castro’s imminent demise.
“They think that this (Castro’s illness) means packing their bags to return to Cuba, as they have prepared for so many times without success,” Alarcon said of the exiles.
Cubans awoke to prevailing normality on the streets Tuesday, the first day in 47 years that Fidel Castro did not have a grip on power.
Residents of Havana and other cities went to work and did errands just like any other day in the knowledge that Raul Castro was provisionally in charge.
Of course the main topic of conversation at bus stops or shop counters was the intestinal ailment that obliged Fidel to undergo surgery that was described as “complicated.” The ailment will require him to rest in bed for “several weeks.”
Prior to Alarcon’s statements, the print and broadcast media – all of them tightly controlled by the Communist regime – had limited themselves to rerunning Castro’s Monday night communique and to spotlighting manifestations of “popular unity” behind the leader and his designated stand-in.
“Popular unity, that is how the people respond to show their support for the proclamation issued yesterday by our commander in chief,” intoned a TV anchorwoman as images aired of pro-government rallies at workplaces across the island.
The intestinal affliction that produced Castro’s internal bleeding was blamed on stress resulting from a recent trip to Argentina for a regional summit, and to the elderly chief’s participation in several events last week marking the beginning of his revolution that toppled dictator Fulgencio Batista on Jan. 1, 1959.
Amid speculation about Castro’s malady, two specialists consulted by EFE agreed that the Cuban leader’s physicians would not have resorted to surgery if the problem had not been extremely serious.
“In reality, no one knows what’s happening,” said Dr. Jorge Herrera, a gastroenterologist who teaches medicine at the University of South Alabama, while adding that “a hemorrhage in a person of that age is normally more complicated.”
“If the doctors couldn’t stop the hemorrhage without performing surgery, and dealing with a person of Castro’s age, the most probable is that it’s a diverticulitis” originating in the colon, according to Herrera.
He said that surgery to address a problem with the colon is “a major operation, in which the mortality rate is significant, especially in people Castro’s age.”
Dr. Anthony Kalloo, chief of gastroenterology at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions in Baltimore, told EFE that Castro’s condition might have been caused by problems originating in his stomach or esophagus, or by the diverticulitis Herrera mentioned.
“Castro is almost 80 years old and when, at that age, it’s necessary to resort to surgery to control the bleeding, there is a grave condition,” Kalloo said.
In the communique read on television Monday night, Castro said celebrations planned to mark his 80th birthday on Aug. 13 will be pushed back to December.
