MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Chavez, the best friend of the Cuban people in their history, says Fidel Castro

Castro said the news, although not unexpected, had been a hard blow

Cuba's Fidel Castro praised the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez as a champion of the poor and said Cubans had lost their best friend ever, in his first comments on the death last week of his socialist ally. Castro said the news, although not unexpected, had been a hard blow.

“On the 5th of March, in the afternoon hours, died the best friend the Cuban people had in their history,” Castro wrote in his “Reflections” column published in Communist Party newspaper Granma.

“We have the honour of having shared with the Bolivarian leader the same ideals of social justice and of support for the exploited,” said the 86-year-old Castro who led Cuba's 1959 revolution, ruled the country for 49 years and still plays a behind-the-scenes role.

“The poor are the poor in any part of the world,” he said.

Castro said he had received a phone call via satellite notifying him of what he called “the bitter news.”

“The significance of the phrase used was unmistakable. Although we knew the critical state of his health, the news hit us hard,” wrote Castro, who resigned as Cuba's president five years ago because of his own health problems.

“I remembered the times he joked with me saying that when both of us finished our revolutionary work, he would invite me to spend time by the Arauca River in Venezuelan territory, which reminded him of the rest he never had,” Castro said.

Castro closed his column by paraphrasing a famous quote from another late friend and revolutionary, Ernesto “Che” Guevara. “Until victory always, unforgettable friend,” Castro wrote of Chavez.

In life, Chavez often referred to Castro as a father figure, mentor and close friend, and after he first won election in 1998, Havana and Caracas grew increasingly close.

 

Chavez supplied Cuba with billions of dollars in subsidized oil to help prop up the island's listing economy, while Havana sent tens of thousands of doctors, teachers, sports trainers and political advisers to work in Venezuela. Venezuela has become Cuba's No. 1 trading partner.

 

Following Chavez's latest surgery in Havana in December, Castro said he checked in on the Venezuelan president's health daily.