WITH this message, President Raúl Castro ended his closing speech at the final session of the National Assembly of People’s Power.

Under the direction of Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada, president of the highest body of state power, the 4th ordinary session of the 7th Legislature began its work with a moving tribute to Commander of the Revolution Juan Almeida Bosque.

During the meeting on Sunday, December 20, the Assembly jointly approved economic and social policy lines and the 2010 state budget. The latter was presented by parliamentary deputy Marino Murillo Jorge, vice president of the Council of Ministers and minister of economy and planning, who reported that despite the country’s complex economic situation, economic growth for 2009 is estimated at 1.4%, and for 2010, the proposed figure is 1.9%.

Deputy Osvaldo Martinez, president of the Economic Affairs Commission, spoke on both documents, and later began the discussions in which several parliamentarians participated.

Also during the session meetings, the seven vacancies on the Council of State were filled: as vice presidents, Commander of the Revolution Ramiro Valdés Menéndez and Gladys Bejerano Portela, the first woman to hold such a high responsibility; and as members, Liudmila Alamo Dueñas, Isis Angelina Diez Duardo, Kirenia Díaz Burke, Marino Murillo Jorge and Sergio Rodríguez Morales.

The Assembly recognized Julio Martínez for having resigning from the Council State so that his seat could be filled by Liudmila Alamo, currently first secretary of the UJC (Union of Young Communists).

Likewise, Jorge Luis Sierra, vice president of the Council of Ministers and minister of transport, presented the proposed Traffic and Transit Code. He emphasized that, in compliance with Decree-law No. 231 of 2002, for the last seven years, a group of experts from the Ministries of the Interior, Transport, Labor and Social Security, Public Health, and Education and Construction have worked on a thorough revision of Law No. 60, the highway administration and transit code.

In presenting the report on the proposed law, Deputy José Luis Toledo Santander, president of the Constitutional and Legal Affairs Commission, said that the recommendation was to continue the nationwide study and analysis of the proposed law, and to postpone the vote on it until the next ordinary session of the Legislature, given the complexity of the issues addressed and the need for a broad knowledge of the law’s contents.

The National Assembly passed proposals to back the position of Cuba and the other member countries of the ALBA bloc (Bolivarian Alternative for the Peoples of Our America) at the recently-concluded summit on climate change in Copenhagen, and to intensify the work underway to demand the liberation of the five Cuban national heroes.

It was also agreed that the year 2010 will be called "Year 52 of the Revolution," in line with the decision taken at the 8th ordinary session of the previous Legislature.

At the beginning of the meeting, Alarcón announced the presence of Evariste Boshab, president of the National Assembly of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and also announced that María Esther Reus González, minister of justice, had occupied her post as parliamentary deputy for the municipality of Sancti Spíritus.