Residents of the town of Levisa, in the municipality of Mayarí, province of Holguín, took to the streets to protest this Thursday, according to a video circulated on social media by journalist José L. Tan Estrada.
The recording shows a screen displaying the text "Now | The people protesting in the street in Levisa, Mayarí," and it was published on Facebook as a testimony of the popular mobilization in that community.
The protest is not an isolated incident in Mayarí. On March 14, residents had already taken to the streets in front of the municipal headquarters of the Communist Party, with clashes and fires in public spaces, at a time when the municipality had been without electricity for up to 51 consecutive hours.
On June 4th, dozens of residents from the Guatemala/Preston community, also in Mayarí, marched with pots and pans to the local police station shouting "Freedom!", "We want electricity!" and "We want water!".
Yesterday, a report documented that the same community continued to lack electricity, drinking water, and medical care, highlighting that the crisis has not abated.
The background is a structural energy emergency. The Electric Company of Holguín admitted in May that its strategy involves leaving entire municipalities without service in order to sustain priority circuits such as hospitals, communications, and government offices.
At the national level, the generation deficit exceeded 1,960 MW on June 5, with an availability of only 1,090 MW against a maximum demand of 3,050 MW, leaving up to 65% of the country without power simultaneously.
Protests in Holguín are occurring alongside a wave of pot-banging that is shaking other provinces. This Wednesday, residents of Santos Suárez, in Havana, took to banging pots after 31 hours without electricity, with an immediate police presence at the scene.
"From Santos Suárez, I have been informed that people are in the streets banging pots and pans after 31 hours without electricity. The police have arrived," reported journalist José Raúl Gallego.
The Cuban Conflict Observatory recorded 1,311 protests in Cuba during May 2026, which is a 65.3% increase from May 2025, with 527 records in the category "challenges to the police state," compared to 305 in April.
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