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 Only one choice appeared for each post in districts across the country and there was no campaigning. The Communist Party is the only party allowed, but the government says membership is not a prerequisite for the parliament that rubber stamps official party policy.
Fidel Castro, the ailing 81-year-old leader who has not been seen in public for nearly 18 months, was among the candidates.
The U.S. government and opposition leaders have dismissed the election as a sham and say reported turnouts lead to a false sense of unanimity.
There was no doubt that voters in Castro's home district would re-elect him to the National Assembly, where he must hold a seat to be eligible to stay on as chief of the island's governing body, the Council of State. The 614 candidates in Sunday's legislative election ran unopposed.
Still unknown, however, is whether the assembly will choose Castro as council president when it convenes for the first time on Feb. 24, or whether the bearded revolutionary will step down after nearly 50 years at Cuba's helm.
Cuban officials say they support Castro's continued presidency, but Castro himself has hinted at retirement, without making his intentions clear. In December, he wrote that he has no intention of clinging to power or standing in the way of a new generation of leaders. Last week, he said he was not well enough to speak to the voters in his district of Santiago.
"I do what I can: I write," he added in an essay published in official media, seeming frustrated. "Writing is not the same as speaking."
On Sunday, Castro cast his ballot as he convalesced at an undisclosed location. He provisionally ceded power to his younger brother Raul in July 2006 following emergency intestinal surgeries, but remained head of the Council of State.
Election officials picked up Castro's sealed ballot and ceremoniously delivered it to a polling place near the Plaza of the Revolution, the seat of government power in Havana. During previous elections, Castro traveled to Santiago on the other end of the island to cast his ballot, trailed by reporters, photographers and cameramen.
But officials insist his health is good enough for him to continue as Cuba's leader.
"You should have no doubt that he's ready," National Assembly President Ricardo Alarcon told reporters after casting his ballot. "He is in a position to continue that job, and the vast majority of Cuba will be more than happy (about that), myself included."
About 8.4 million voters on Sunday backed 614 candidates who ran for the rubber-stamp parliament. Electoral officials said an estimated 95 percent of registered voters had cast ballots an hour before polling stations closed Sunday evening.
Cuba maintains that its balloting is more democratic than most because those running are chosen by municipal leaders nominated at neighborhood gatherings. But U.S. officials and other critics counter that the elections do not represent a real opportunity for Cubans to decide for themselves how and by whom they will be governed. Only one candidate appears on the ballot for each district post.
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 Many Cubans say they feel compelled to vote in a country where neighborhood leaders have a say in their chances to get jobs, housing and other official approvals.
Casting his vote in Havana, Raul Castro announced the Feb. 24 date for the new National Assembly's first session, but would not say whether his brother would stand for the presidency again or retire. He suggested Cuba is entering "a complex chapter, in which we have to face different situations and great decisions."
After nearly 18 months away from public view, a decision by Castro to retain his presidential post could derail what thus far has been a seamless transition of duties to Raul, the 76-year-old defense minister.
"The temporary transfer of power would, in effect, be annulled," Marifeli Perez-Stable, vice president for democratic governance at the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington D.C. and a professor at Florida International University, wrote in December.
"It'd be an embarrassment for Raul Castro and the others that they couldn't rein in the physically diminished Comandante," Perez-Stable wrote, using a title commonly used on the island to refer to Castro. "It would be an affront to ordinary Cubans to have this man
-- so ill he hasn't appeared live before them for 17 months -- declared their president again."
Cubans appear to have adjusted well to Raul, so much so that they rarely talk about Fidel anymore, except to occasionally comment on his published essays.
Many hope that with a permanent role, Raul could promote a modest opening in the state-controlled economy, to provide breathing space to those stifled by rules that allow little opportunity to legally increase income in a country where government salaries average US$17 (euro11.60) a month.
"Now, at the age of 81, handicapped and incapable of providing coherent leadership, the end of his historic reign is imminent," former U.S. intelligence officer Brian Latell said of Fidel Castro in an essay earlier this month.
"It seems all but certain that, voluntarily or not, he'll vacate the Cuban presidency early this year, though he may symbolically hold onto some new, wholly honorific title," added Latell, who has studied the Castro brothers for decades.
[Associated
Press]
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