Cuba’s National Assembly passed a sweeping update to its family law on Friday, paving the way for allowing same-sex marriage, more rights for women and greater protection for children, the elderly and other family members. .
Before taking effect, however, the new Family Code needs to be approved in a referendum on 25 September, after being debated at community meetings earlier this year, at which organizers said 62% of participants expressed their support.
This is relatively low by Cuban standards, where the newly approved constitution passed with 86% of the vote. Policy proposals in previous referendums had around 95% support.
The code promotes “love, affection, care, sensitivity, respect for others and the harmony of our families”, said Justice Minister Oscar Manuel Silvera, presenting the law for a vote in the National Assembly.
Churches oppose the changes. “What is happening is sad because it will bring confrontation,” said Methodist pastor Henry Nurse. “This goes against what has been taught by many generations around the world about the true traditional marriage that is between a man and a woman.”
In addition to legalizing same-sex marriage and civil unions, the law will allow LGBTQIA+ couples to adopt children, prenuptial agreements and surrogate pregnancy, albeit on a non-profit basis.
Under the new code, parents will have “responsibility” rather than “custody” for their children, and will be obliged to “respect the dignity and physical and mental integrity of children and adolescents.”
Cuba is already a regional leader in women’s rights — they head almost 50% of households and represent 60% of professionals, have free access to abortion and can claim maternity leave of up to two years.
Rita Acosta Cruz and Gabriela Alfonso, a couple from Havana who have lived together for many years but never managed to have children, said it was their right to marry and adopt children. “The opportunity that [o código] gives us is the wedding. The fact that we can choose together for certain things and certain legal procedures that we need as a couple and not as independent people,” Alfonso said.
Acosta said the proposal meets their expectations as a family. “We are a marriage. We have the plans together, the economy together. It’s not fair that this possibility doesn’t exist.”
Approved in 2019, the new Constitution of Cuba removed the definition of marriage as being exclusive between a man and a woman – which was in the old Charter -, and started to characterize it as “a social and legal institution”, without being linked to genres.
