Why did the Cubans take to the streets, but in unheard protests? Coronavirus pandemic News

Habanan, Cuba – On Monday morning, October 10, the streets of the Havana neighborhood were cleared.

The only sign of the violence of the previous night was the old men in ragged work clothes digging the last dust from the surface of the road, leaving only the pieces of gray where the thrown bricks had fallen.

And yet, this street, heading south to the suburbs of Havana, to the beautiful church of Jesus del Monte, perched on a hill, protests took place in the Cuban capital on Sunday, but were not heard.

Other protests took place across the country, when the first rallies began outside Havana, in the town of San Antonio de los Banos. Demonstrators shouted “Libertad” – freedom – and “Patria y Vida”, the game of homeland and life, the revolutionary slogan Patria o Muerte, which signifies the revolutionaries’ willingness to die for the homeland. “We’re not afraid,” they also shouted.

Videos and news of the protests spread through social media, sparking more demonstrations across the country at 1,250 kilometers.

Thousands of people walked by

In the Cuban province of Santiago, people marched in the town of Palma Soriano. Incidents were reported in Santa Clara, in the center of the country and in Cardenas, the town most affected by the coronavirus pandemic.

As the protests spread so quickly, the government was caught unawares and President Miguel Diaz Canel joined all the programming – including the Euro 2020 football final – to call for people to take to the streets to defend the revolution.

Surrounded by great security, he appeared on the streets of San Antonio de los Baños, calling the protesters “provocateurs” and suggesting that they were deceived into action by opposing revolutionary forces backed by foreign powers. “We call on all the revolutionaries in the country, all the communists, to take to the streets,” he said later when he appeared on television.

Ramiro Valdes, who fought alongside Castro at the age of 89 and became vice president before retiring earlier this year, tweeted that the protesters “were crimes in the service of the empire, following the instructions given by the owners.” Given that the majority of protesters were young, his comments showed a marked generational schism that opened up in Cuba.

Diaz Canel’s appearance in San Antonio de los Banos was clearly designed to echo the last major protests in Cuba in 1994, during a special period in Cuba, when the economy collapsed after the economy withdrew financial support from the Soviet Union. Then, President Fidel Castro appeared at the famous Corniche in Havana, Malecon, to talk about the protesters.

The echoes of the famine of that time are now evident.

Growing problems

Cuba’s problems have been growing slowly over the years as a lack of investment and obsolescence have caused more and more – but the pandemic has exacerbated the problems. Last year, tourism came to a standstill and the economy shrank by 11 percent, a figure that is believed to be much worse so far.

Many Cubans worked directly in tourism or on its shores, earning enough to feed their families or otherwise relying on money sent from abroad. All these sources of money have been exhausted.

Meanwhile, the government merged two currencies it was running: the convertible Cuban Pes with the US dollar attached to it and the Cuban Pes. It was long seen as a necessary restructuring – the system protected the outdated and inefficient Cuban industry – but it was at the heart of the crisis.

The move saw the return of the U.S. dollar as a regular bid. The government, in order to increase the hard currencies it has to pay for imported goods, moved many necessities to stores called “MLC” where only hard currencies (i.e. foreign ones) were allowed.

The black market settled down immediately as the street value of the pesos fell by half or worse than its official rate against the US dollar and the euro. The huge queue in MLC stores means that the black food market has appeared.

These exchanges benefit those with access to foreign currency, even as the cost of food increases, those with dollars pay roughly for bread, eggs, and medicines previously made (other products, like milk, but impossible to obtain).

On the other side of the bargain, however, for those who have to buy foreign currency with pesos earned, food and medicine prices doubled and doubled again. Demonstrators on Sunday told reporters that they had gone to the streets because people were hungry and had nothing to eat.

Power cuts are now exacerbating the problem. In most countries, the government has had four or six hours of blackouts due to worn-out parts that cannot be replaced by the 60-year embargo imposed on Cuba by the United States. COVID-19 said it should also protect food sources for hospitals that deal with victims.

Creating a storm

At 9 a.m. Monday, while the streets were quiet, state television began showing the council of ministers meeting. Local journalists asked the president, the health minister and those responsible for electricity and food supply. Diaz-Canel has blamed the protests for “economic suffocation” in the U.S.

He also set fire to protesters. “They threw stones at foreign currency stores, stole items,” he said, before calling their behavior “ordinary, senseless and delinquent”.

Since the protests began, Cubans have been complaining about the internet being shut down all over the island. Meanwhile, social media on the other side of the Florida Strait was sparked. Sections of the Cuban community in South Florida called for “intervention” and gathered outside the iconic restaurant in exile in Versailles.

Police cars overturned on Havana Street on July 11 [Yamil Lage/AFP]

Miami Mayor Francis Suarez told people, “The United States and the international community need to do something now. The Cuban people need medicine. They are hungry. They need international support. “

Michael Bustamante, a seasoned Cuban observer and assistant professor of Latin American literature at Florida International University, responded to the most extreme call for intervention on Twitter: “This does NOT help.”

US President Joe Biden said in a statement: “We unite with the Cuban people and clearly demand their freedom and liberty from the horrific support of the pandemic and the economic repression and suffering it has endured for decades.

Outside the trenches in the trenches, when police shouted at protesters the night before, occasionally going to the crowd to arrest people, the relatives of the detainees were patiently seated.

The sun was bright but above it was gathering one of Havana’s most horrible summer storms.