Antonio Manresa Pardo is 66 years old; he lost one eye eleven years ago and has poor vision in the other, according to the medical certificate that confirms this and which CiberCuba has accessed. Due to his vulnerable condition, he was fortunate to be allocated a plot of land in Campo Florido (East Havana) in 2015, along with 23 other people who also received similar concessions. However, as he himself explains, that land "disappeared." Many had paid a deposit, and those who received that money left the country. After numerous complaints and years of waiting, the housing authorities relocated the beneficiaries of that social aid between Alamar and Bahía, also in East Havana.
Manresa himself explains that in 2019 he found the documents certifying the allocation of the land in Campo Florido. From there, he began a lengthy process with all conceivable official institutions. He went to the PCC, the Government, the newspaper Granma, until he decided to appear countless times at the Council of State. "I think they knew me there, from the number of times I went," he says in a video accessed by CiberCuba.
Tired of being tossed around, one day he threatened the provincial government official whom he identifies as Juanita, and told her that if they didn't provide him with a place to live, he would go to the Plaza de la Revolución with a sign to demand help. "That was at 9:00 AM. By noon, I was granted a shelter in H, between 26 and 27, in Cojímar. I stayed there for a year and eight months until they gave me this place on Avenida 15, building 9038, apartment 10, in Bahía. But they didn't tell me that this house would be given to me in exchange for 350,700 pesos. If they had told me that while I was in the shelter, I would have stayed in the shelter," he explains.
This is how he was assigned a small apartment located in the basement of a 12-story building in Reparto Bahía, which, far from bringing him peace, has brought him, as he himself claims, "a lot of misfortune."
In this way, Manresa received an apartment that is about 35 square meters and has the essentials for living, but it is not free. Last April, the Provincial Housing Authority of Habana del Este summoned him and handed him a notification stating that the price of his home is 350,797.66 pesos and that he must either pay 179 monthly installments of 1,959.76 pesos or he will not be the owner of the property, but a tenant.
Provincial authorities overlooked an important detail: after a lifetime of working for a state that claimed to be socialist, Antonio Manresa receives a monthly pension of 1,543 pesos. "It barely covers the cost of a croquette. Every time I receive it, I’m already in debt. My situation is critical, and the government tells me to ask my son for 350,000 pesos, but I can't count on my son; I rely on the government," he states. In this predicament, it is impossible for him to manage the payments proposed by the authorities of a regime that also claimed to represent the humble.
According to the Housing Law, the small room allocated to Antonio Manresa has a legal price of 4,270 Cuban pesos, but the amount budgeted by the Cuban authorities multiplies this figure by 82, disregarding both the vulnerability and the actual risk of poverty of the pensioner who is being asked for an amount of money that exceeds his means.
Antonio Manresa Pardo does not have Internet on his phone (+53 50770035) and cannot afford it. He also cannot afford to pay what the government demands from him, much less lose his home. He is desperate. He has once again gone to the Council of State, and they have sent him to see social workers in Vedado. His house is up in the air.
Filed under: