A 26-year-old Cuban woman identified as Sarabi Pedro Tovega became the center of an urgent call for solidarity after being visited by the Proyecto YA, a civic initiative that spread her case on Saturday through Instagram.
Sarabi is a single mother of five children and is currently in the postpartum period: the two youngest are newborn twins just 20 days old at the time of publication.
In the video, she describes her situation bluntly: "My name is Sarabi, I have five children. I had my first at 19, and right now I am a single mother. The situation here in Cuba is very difficult for raising five children. And nothing, moving forward is what I have to do."
The living conditions of the family are extremely poor. Sarabi cooks with charcoal because power outages are frequent in Cuba, and she washes the clothes in the same space where she prepares food. This situation mirrors the plight of thousands of families in a country where the housing deficit on the island exceeds 900,000 homes.
"I wash there; that's where I cook, and I cook with charcoal because the issue of electricity affects us a lot here," the young woman recounts.
His testimony demonstrates how the Cuban State has systematically failed to fulfill its promises of support to single mothers.
Cases like that of Sarabi demonstrate that social media has become the main channel of assistance for Cubans in vulnerable situations, allowing the mobilization of donations and community support both inside and outside the island.
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