On September 11, after several days of marked cutbacks on public transportation, Cuba President Miguel Diaz-Canel warned on national television that Cuba was facing an immediate energy crisis due to lack of diesel fuel. As a result, he said, “There may be problems with the distribution of products that depend on diesel-fueled transport, in public transport and in energy generation, which we’re trying to take measures to avoid.”[1]
The Cuban Government’s Initial Comments on the Shortages
In those September 11 remarks, the President recognized problems with the supply of fuels that have caused the congestion of the bus stops, but insisted that it is a “short-term” situation and called the Cubans, tired of going through moments of this type, to see it as ” a workout.” “We have a strategy to win. Beauty is in the challenging situations … what happens is convenient.”
He also called for “sharing the promotion of savings as a practice of life and altruism as an attitude to the lack of fuel.” Likewise, to “confront with rigor and firmness manifestations of crime associated with the diversion of resources, and to the possible opportunistic attitude with which certain people may behave in the middle of this situation (…) raising prices, monopolizing products or speculating.”
There was no new “special period,” Diaz-Canel said, even though “there may be tense situations in the distribution of some products and the provision of services to the population in the coming days.” Now, however, “we have strengths that didn’t exist [in the 1990s] and that draws a qualitatively different scenario.” However, according to Diario de Cuba, the following “new strengths” are distrusted by the Cuban people: the “economic and social development strategy” of the [Communist Party of Cuba],” the “conceptualization of the economic and social model,” the “basis for the elaboration of the economic and social plan to 2030 and to keep moving forward” and the new Constitution.
This shortage will continue until the expected September 14 arrival of a tanker with diesel fuel and then another shipment at the end of the month. Contracts for October shipments are being negotiated.
A related problem was the negative impact on Cuban imports of food.
The government officials blamed the U.S. for this shortage. The U.S., they said, persists in “trying to prevent the arrival of fuel to Cuba” and applying “unilateral measures to limit our contracts with shipping companies that deliver resources to Cuba.” Some of these shipping companies have ceased to provide this service.
The government officials also pointed out that Cuba produces about 40 percent of its demand for petroleum that is uses to operate its thermoelectric plants.
Díaz-Canel concluded his address with these words, “These are times of Fatherland or Death.”
Only the preceding day (September 10) Diaz-Canel held a public meeting to discuss the status of projects to construct and maintain the country’s roads. He said the government intended to spend more than 174 million pesos on such projects by 2020. Such efforts this year had been adversely affected by lack of fuel and cement and limited financial resources.
The Cuban Government’s Other Comments on the Shortages[2]
On September 12, President Diaz-Canel again appeared on television to comment on the shortage. He said, with a laugh, “”Now we have to go tighter.” After the prior announcement of the shortage, he has “received revolutionary feelings, support, understanding . . . [that] is more than a fuel supertanker can contribute.” People express “concerns,” but few “dissatisfactions.” There is “enthusiasm,” especially “among young people,” with the call for “austerity” and “solidarity.”
The next day, Friday, “Cubans queued for hours for public transport on Friday at peak times in Havana, sweating in the heavy heat, while queues at gas stations snaked several blocks long, as a fuel shortage that the government blames on U.S. sanctions began to bite.” In addition, government inspectors “flagged down workers with state cars or trucks to get them to pick others up.” An ordinary 55-year-old Cuban, Alexei Perez Recio, said, “The transport situation is getting ugly, even if the state says it is only temporary” as he was fixing up his bicycle he had not used since the Special Period. “I have to have (my bike) ready.”
Reactions[3]
An editorial in Diario de Cuba, which is a website from Madrid, Spain, complained about the Cuban government’s again blaming the U.S. embargo for the island’s ills, not “the lack of foresight of the Cuban Government, nor its profound inefficiency or the failed system it defends.”
The Government’s solution, according to this editorial, was to reprogram trains, ask the people to squeeze together on the buses and seek solidarity from the citizens.
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[1] Diaz-Canel evaluates the progress of economic programs in Cuba, Cubadebate (Sept. 10, 2019); Assoc. Press, Cuba’s President Warns That Energy Cutbacks Are Looming, N.Y. Times (Sept, 11, 2019); Cuban President announces measures to deal with conjunctural fuel shortage, Granma (Sept. 12, 2019); Havanans support government measures to face energy situation, Cubadebate (Sept. 12, 2019); ‘We have to endure, it’s a few days’: Diaz-Canel minimizes the fuel crisis in Cuba, Diario de Cuba (Sept. 12, 2019); Cubans warned of imminent severe fuel crisis due to US sanctions, BBC News (Sept. 12, 2019).
[2] ‘We have to endure, it’s a few days’: Diaz-Canel minimizes the fuel crisis in Cuba, Diario de Cuba (Sept. 12, 2019); Gamez Torres, Cuban leader blames Trump for oil shortages, announces more austerity measures, Miami Herald (Sept. 12, 2019); Diaz-Canel: ‘Now we have to go tighter, ’Diario de Cuba (Sept. 13, 2019); Reuters, Cuba’s Acute Fuel Shortage Begins to Bite, N.Y. Times (Sept. 13, 2019).
[3] Editorial: What the Round Table explained about the ‘conjuncture’ in Cuba, Diario de Cuba (Sept. 13, 2019).
