Castro son-in-law promoted to general

Posted on Wednesday, 03.19.14



Castro son-in-law promoted to general

BY JUAN O. TAMAYO

JTAMAYO@ELNUEVOHERALD.COM



A powerful son-in-law of Cuban ruler Raúl Castro, in charge of the

military enterprises that dominate the island's economy, has been

promoted to general despite recurring reports of tensions with his wife

and brother-in-law.



Luis Alberto Rodriguez Lopez-Callejas, in his mid-50s and long

identified as a colonel in the Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR), was

identified as a brigadier general in a Jan. 29 report in the Web pages

of Cubadefensa, a FAR publication.



Rodriguez heads the Enterprise Administration Group (GAESA), the FAR's

business arm — the military controls 80 percent of the Cuban economy,

including hotels, factories, restaurants and airlines — and sits on the

Central Committee of the Communist Party.



He also is spearheading the $1 billion development project for the Port

of Mariel west of Havana, Cuba's strategic bet for reinserting itself

into the global economy with the help of $800 million in financing from

Brazil.



Military promotions in secretive Cuba are seldom announced, but

Cubadefensa revealed his new rank in a brief report saying he attended a

ceremony marking the 20th anniversary of the military-run Almacenes

Universales S.A.



Rodriguez, married to Castro's oldest daughter, Deborah Castro Espín, is

widely viewed as one of the most powerful and ambitious men in Cuba —

smart, arrogant, frugal and a highly effective administrator of GAESA.



His promotion to general supported speculation that he might succeed

Castro eventually because he holds a high military rank, knows the

economy, comes from a good family and married into an even more

important one. His father, Maj. Gen. Guillermo Rodríguez del Pozo, was

one of the Fidel Castro guerrillas who seized power in 1959.



"This means that he remains in contention, despite what people have been

saying about his troubles," said Luis Dominguez, a Miami exile who first

reported Rodriguez's promotion in his blog, Cuba al Descubierto — Cuba

Uncovered.



Retired CIA analyst Brian Latell, who authored two books on Cuba, said

the new rank is commensurate with the general's responsibilities at the

very profitable GAESA. "I would say he earned his star fair and square,"

he said.



But Rodriguez also has been reported to have clashed often with Deborah

and her brother, Alejandro Castro Espín, 48, an Interior Ministry

colonel who is Castro's chief intelligence advisor and runs a tough

anti-corruption campaign.



"He is too openly ambitious for Alejandro, and there's always been

tension there," said a Havana man who has friends in the Castro clan. He

asked to remain anonymous in order to speak frankly.



Raúl Castro, who succeeded his brother Fidel in 2006, has one son and

three daughters: Deborah, who is about 52; Mariela, 51, a sexologist

married to an Italian; and Vilma, the youngest. Castro's wife, Vilma

Espín, died in 2007 after a long illness.



Havana journalist Carlos Cabrera Pérez, writing in a Miami blog in

January 2013, reported that Deborah Castro Espín had filed for divorce

at the end of 2012, alleging quarrels and infidelities by Rodriguez.



Her decision to seek a divorce came after the couple quarreled,

Alejandro Castro Espín came to his sister's defense and the two men

clashed "with their hands," Cabrera Perez wrote, citing unidentified

sources close to the family.



Juan Juan Almeida, who had close ties to the Raul Castro family before

he moved to Miami, wrote in a column last month published by Radio/TV

Martí that Rodriguez's star had fallen because of the family problems.



Castro "will send, or already sent, the father of his grandchildren to

carry out a mission in Angola, a dangerous land for a Cuban in

disgrace," Almeida wrote.



Rodriguez is the father of Castro's favorite grandson, Raúl Guillermo

Rodríguez Castro, who is the Cuban leader's closest bodyguard and aide.

The grandson is known as "The Crab" because he was born with six fingers

on each hand.



Dominguez said the general has a brother Gustavo, 55, who left Cuba for

treatment of a brain tumor and now lives in southwestern Florida with

his wife, María Victoria Balius Rodríguez. She has a daughter from a

previous marriage to a son of Fidel Castro, Alexis Castro Soto del Valle.



Dominguez also said that the United Nations report on a Cuban weapons

shipment to North Korea last summer that violated an arms embargo on the

Asian country showed the shipment was loaded abroad a freighter at the

Port of Mariel.



The U.N. report noted that the ongoing Mariel expansion program was led

by Almacenes Universales — part of GAESA's holdings and the company

whose 20th anniversary celebration Rodriguez attended.



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