Caracas, Venezuela.- More than 22,000 Cuban professionals collaborating in Venezuela are preparing Monday to participate in the constitutional referendum scheduled for February 2019, the Cuban ambassador in Caracas, Rogelio Polanco, announced.

‘With the approval by Parliament of the final draft, every Cuban has the responsibility to go to the polls to decide with his her vote, and in Venezuela we will do it too’, the diplomat said.

The Constitutional letter was enriched with the opinions of hundreds of thousands of Cubans throughout the country between Aug 13 and Nov 15. ‘It is a demonstration of genuine revolutionary, socialist democracy which categorically denies those who announced apathy to debate the country we want’ , Polanco added.

The diplomatic headquarters in Caracas will become an electoral center as will be almost 700 other sites throughout Venezuela for more than 22,000 Cubans workers to cast their vote in the referendum, the official said during the early celebration of the 60th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution.

During the popular consultation, more than 5,600 proposals or propositions for changes, additions or elimination and doubts were made by Cubans on Venezuelan territory.

In this regard, the ambassador described as transcendental the exchanges of collaborators with considerations and opinions that covered the most dissimilar aspects of the constitutional letter, he said last September in statements to Prensa Latina.

All the parliamentarians attending the second ordinary session of the 9th Legislature (583 out of 602) of the National Assembly of People’s Power (parliament) approved this draft on December 22nd, which was enriched after several days of debate.

The draft ratifies Cuba’s socialist character and the leading role of the Communist Party in its society. It also establishes changes in the structure of the State – such as the creation of the President of the Republic and the Prime Minister – and expands citizens’ rights and guarantees.