By Rosa Miriam Elizalde on November 7, 2024
photo: Yamil Lage, AFP
Cuba has experienced the deepest energy crisis in living memory. On Friday, October 18, the whole country went dark and the outages continued, although more than 60 percent of Cubans had been enduring for several weeks blackouts of more than 14 hours and interruptions in essential services, from drinking water supply to communication and public health.
While the transnational media briefly turned their gaze to the island and Florida’s professional intoxication systems called for civil disobedience on the Internet, to “take to the streets” and showed how to build Molotov cocktails, the extensive blackout of Cubans appeared everywhere, but the darkest note of this reality was often silenced: the prolonged blockade imposed by the United States for more than six decades.
For the reader of La Jornada, the viewers of Telesur and some other media with influence in sectors of the left, the blockade is a common topic or an obligatory footnote. But after so much talk about it in our circuits, it is often passed over with a yawn, which reminds us that one of the risks of the naturalization of violence, whatever it may be, is that we tend to think that it cannot be eliminated and that we must live with it from here to eternity.
The massive blackout of these days, which occurred simultaneously with the passage of Hurricane Oscar followed by Hurricane Rafael, has shown that violence systematically exercised against the people of Cuba, which has deep roots in the U.S. economic war and evidences the success of the policy of maximum pressure established by Donald Trump and kept intact by Joe Biden. Since 2019 the noose around the neck has been tightening coldly in full view of everyone and all that remains is for the floor to definitely creak.
The energy crisis suffered by the island is not new, but the intensity and duration of the blackouts show the seriousness of the situation. Cuban authorities attributed the drop in service to the lack of fuel and the difficulties to keep the power generation plants in operation. Thermoelectric plants, the centerpiece of the energy system, operate with obsolete equipment and require constant maintenance, something that has become impossible due to U.S. sanctions.
Cuba cannot access spare parts, advanced technology and international financing to modernize its energy infrastructure. Nor can it easily acquire fuel because it cannot afford to pay for freight or because access to international oil markets is restricted due to U.S. pressure on third countries, banks and shipping companies that trade with the island. As a result, Cuba depends on irregular fuel supplies, largely from allies such as Venezuela, which also faces U.S. sanctions and struggles with its own economic problems.
This dependence on external energy sources and the impossibility of modernizing the power grid have created an explosive cocktail that leads to frequent blackouts, aggravated by the wear and tear of power plants. The Cuban energy sector, which was already in a critical situation, is now trapped in a vicious circle: without fuel, it cannot generate electricity, and without electricity, the economy and the population’s quality of life collapse.
This translates into uncertainty and despair. In many neighborhoods, neighbors made collective pots in improvised wood stoves, not only out of solidarity, but also because families could not preserve food due to lack of refrigeration, which in the short term worsens the already precarious food situation.
Hospitals, although equipped with emergency generators, could not operate at full capacity during long periods without electricity, which has put at risk the lives of patients who depend on medical equipment. Water could not be pumped and gas could not reach the kitchen. Internet access and telecommunications services have also been severely limited, isolating many people from the outside world.
The architects of the blockade know very well that suffering places millions of people in a mistaken and dangerous tunnel vision where only every man for himself is the solution. They are also specialists in throwing a stone and hiding their hand. The White House Press Secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, affirmed that the policy of that country has had nothing to do with the energy crisis in the Caribbean island and that her government would be willing to send aid to the Cubans, if Havana asks for it.
When blackouts have nested in Cuba, there is no greater leap into the dark than Washington’s political cynicism.
Source: Juventud Rebelde, translation Resumen Latinoamericano – English