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The capture of Nicolás Maduro by U.S. forces at the beginning of January not only marked the end of Chavismo as a regional power but also left the Cuban regime without its main source of energy supply.
Without the Venezuelan shipments that supported the Island's economy for more than two decades, Havana is now forced to seek fuel in the farthest corners of the planet, even in Africa, as the country sinks into an unprecedented electrical crisis.
The maritime traffic data shows that the tanker Mia Grace, flying the flag of the Marshall Islands, departed from the port of Lomé in Togo on January 19 and is heading to Havana with an estimated cargo of 17,000 tons of fuel, according to the monitoring account of transport media FalconEyes.
The vessel, built in 2014 and with a capacity of 30,000 tons, is sailing towards the Cuban capital and is expected to arrive on February 4, according to records from the specialized portal VesselFinder.
Jorge Piñón, an expert from the Energy Institute at the University of Texas, explained to Diario de Cuba that the purchase was reportedly made by the company Cubametales, which is part of the military conglomerate GAESA, through a European intermediary.
"The quality of the product is unclear, but it is speculated that it could be diesel or fuel oil," noted Piñón. He specified that Togo does not produce oil, but operates as a logistical transit point for international fuel trade.
The journey of Mia Grace confirms what analysts have already warned: without Venezuela and with Russia tied up in the war in Ukraine, the regime of Miguel Díaz-Canel has lost its main sources of cheap energy.
Shipments from Mexico and some smaller deliveries from Russia fail to meet an internal demand of about 100,000 barrels per day, of which 40,000 come from domestic production. The rest is simply absent.
The direct consequence of this shortage is the collapse of the Cuban electrical system. The Electric Union (UNE) acknowledged this week that more than 100 distributed generation plants are out of service due to a lack of diesel, while another 156 megawatts have been lost due to a shortage of lubricants.
In total, over 1,100 megawatts—almost a third of the national demand—are currently offline. Additionally, there are breakdowns at the thermoelectric plants in Mariel, Felton, Renté, and Santa Cruz del Norte, as well as the partial shutdown of the Turkish barges rented by Havana to compensate for the lack of generation.
In the midst of the crisis, the United States has chosen a strategy of controlled pressure. Although President Donald Trump reiterated that "there will be no more oil or money for Cuba," his administration has allowed Mexico to continue supplying crude oil and refined products to the Island, as revealed by the network CBS News.
U.S. officials explained that the goal is not to provoke a sudden collapse, but rather to "pressure Havana to abandon its authoritarian communist model and come to the negotiating table."
Meanwhile, the government of Claudia Sheinbaum defends these shipments as "humanitarian aid," a justification that few believe both inside and outside of Mexico. In 2025, her administration exported more than 10 billion Mexican pesos in petroleum products to Cuba.
For Cuba, however, that assistance is insufficient. Blackouts extend up to 20 hours a day in some provinces, hospitals operate with depleted generators, and families turn to coal or firewood for cooking.
In neighborhoods of Havana and Sancti Spíritus, nightly protests have become common, suppressed by security forces deployed under the supposed "state of war."
The arrival of the Mia Grace from Africa, if it materializes, will only provide a temporary reprieve. The regime is seeking fuel wherever it can find it, lacking sufficient foreign currency and with an increasingly limited network of international allies.
Without Venezuela, Cuba faces its toughest test since the fall of the Soviet bloc, this time with no room for maneuver and an exhausted population.
The question that hangs in the air, just like thirty years ago, is still the same: How much longer can the Castro regime endure with an energy crisis that continues to worsen?
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