It is only through popular consultation and exchange with the people about social and economic policies that we were going to define the strategic direction of Cuba in the next years. To reach prosperous and sustainable socialism, which is our aspiration, we discussed that with the entire population.

There is no one more talkative than Cubans, Cubans express their feelings, there's nobody more rebellious and revolutionary than a Cuban and I say that without chauvinism.

Socialism is overcoming certain difficulties, it is working in order to try to achieve social advances, to really achieve a society where everybody improves, not where just the elite improve and the others get worse.

As you know Cuba has progressed a lot regarding all the indicators of social development and those rates can be compared favorably with the first world in several aspects. We think that without the heavy burden of the blockade that we can move forward a lot more in building prosperous and sustainable socialism to which we aspire.

When we talked about going to help Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea Conakry how many doctors in Cuba raised their hands to go? 15 thousand. In their homes they said, "We are willing to go risk our lives to help other countries". That is true medicine; it is the true observance of the Hippocratic Oath that doctors swear to.

In Cuba, our experiment is not the best democracy and should not be a reference to anybody elses, it is ours. It has worked for us and the clearest evidence that our democracy has worked is that there is a revolution that has continued after a half century of facing down the most powerful empire. This has not happened many times in history.

There is us living the Cuban experience that we believe is ours. We do not believe that it is perfect, but it has been above all counting truly on the people, which is where the origins of true democracy lie.