Cuba held parliamentary elections this Sunday with 70.34% of the vote, according to the National Electoral Council (CEN), with the highest abstention rate since the victory of the Revolution.

He Electoral census It is calculated 8.23 ​​percentage points less than the one issued in the previous parliamentary sessions in 2018, in the socialist era of this country.

At a press conference, CEN President Alina Balseiro predicted that preliminary results would be published on Monday.

Historically from 1976 to 2013 participation percentage it amounted to 90%, although in 2018 an inflow of 85% was registered.

For comparison, abstinence in appointments to the polls last year in Cuba was higher. In the municipal elections last November, it reached 31%, and in the referendum on the Family Code, held in September, it was 26%.

In this Sunday’s election, 470 candidates were registered for the same number of seats in parliament, none of them from the opposition, as they were all communist party Cuba (PCC) or related organizations.

In addition, in the campaigns played in the state media, they filled the content with calls to vote in blocks in each constituency, in addition to the fact that on the ballot, voters could only cross out the box in which the candidates were. together.

The election was extended for another hour from the time of the vote as a strategy to get more votes in favor of the party in power; this Sunday, even currency acceptance points were not opened.

There were no international observers that day, and the situation was criticized by the opposition and non-governmental organizations such as Election Transparency.

“The results published National Electoral Council they are irrefutable” and going in the opposite direction of “the abstaining trend that CEN itself reflected (…) We request independent verification that the announced results are reliable.”

There were groups that denounced attacks on non-governmental and independent journalists on election observation missions.

Cubalex registered 27 incidents of reprisals at 21:00 local time against more than 30 of these people who, in the days leading up to the election, said they had been pressured and threatened in connection with the call to abstain as a rejection of the Cuban political system or to carry out surveillance tasks .

This apparent decline in voter interest was interpreted as a consequence of the economic crisis in the country, which could have caused a penalty vote according to President Miguel Diaz-Canelwho rejected abstention.

“I don’t think they are the best, because it was not the only time with difficulties, with economic difficulties.”

Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez also noted that this Cuban election is larger than any other election in the world in terms of the number of participants.

” Cuban elections they will continue to be different in terms of more participation and democracy than most that can be seen on the planet.”

With information from agencies.