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'Prove it and I'll resign'
16/05/2006 14:37 - (SA)
By Vanessa Arrington
Havana - Cuban President Fidel Castro says he'll resign the day his critics prove he has money in foreign accounts.
Castro was speaking in a special television appearance on the government's daily public affairs programme Mesa Redonda (Round Table) on Monday.
He was rebutting a Forbes magazine report naming him one of the world's wealthiest rulers.
The 79-year-old leader said he has showed throughout his life that he is uninterested in material possessions.
"Why would I want money, especially now that I'm going to be 80-years-old?" said Castro. "Why would I want money now, if I never wanted it before?"
He called the report "rubbish", and said "all this makes me sick".
In its May 5 article, "Fortunes of kings, queens and dictators", Forbes put Castro in seventh place of world leaders with "lofty positions and vast fortunes".
The magazine estimated Castro's personal wealth at $900m (about R5.5bn) - nearly double that of the $500m of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II.
'I have been listening to this wickedness'
The article also referred to rumours of Castro having "large stashes in Swiss bank accounts".
"I've been listening to this wickedness for nearly half a century - I don't pay much attention," said Castro. "Neither lies nor slander are worth anything."
Later on in the four-and-a-half hour programme, Castro pounded the table emotionally, saying, "If they can prove I have an account abroad containing even one dollar I will resign my post."
Several top Cuban officials also rejected the article during the broadcast.
Forbes assumed Castro has economic control
"It is absolutely impossible that someone in the upper levels of government - and especially not a leader (like Castro)... who is recognised by the Cuban people as an example of humility and self-discipline - could maintain personal accounts abroad," said central bank president Francisco Soberon.
Soberon called the Forbes article "grotesque slander", and blamed the CIA and an American press controlled by "the empire" for the magazine's "vulgar and ridiculous" claims.
Forbes explained its calculations for the article. It said it assumed Castro has economic control over a web of state-owned companies, including a convention centre, a retail conglomerate and an enterprise that sells Cuban-produced pharmaceuticals.
Soberon said that all the money made from those companies is pumped back into the island's economy, into sectors including health, education, science, security, defence, and solidarity projects with other countries.
Forbes acknowledged that its estimates for the leaders in the article were "more art than science".
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