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The families of Olivia Hernández Pérez, 27, and her boyfriend Silvio René Garzón Molina, 36, have been without news of the couple for days, missing after the collapse of the Coral Park building in La Guaira, Venezuela, where they were on the sixth floor when the devastating double earthquake struck on June 24.
Both young people had arrived in Venezuela just seven days before the earthquake, on June 19, with tourist visas and the hope of escaping the crisis that suffocates Cuba.
«We haven't heard anything yet. What I want is for my son to appear. I... want to know about my son, because I have a lot of faith,» declared Regla Molina, mother of Silvio René, in a testimony that encapsulates the anguish experienced by two families in Havana.
Ailín Pérez López, Olivia's godmother, vividly described the condition of the building where the couple was staying: "The building, we have it in photos that people have posted... it's completely destroyed. There's nothing left."
Olivia was a psychologist and lived in the Bahía neighborhood of Havana del Este with her mother, a doctor who was ill. Her goal upon emigrating was clear: to work in order to take her mother out of Cuba before the end of the year. "Godmother, I'm going ahead, I want to start working in anything before December. I'm going to try to get ahead to bring my mom out," were her last words before boarding the plane.
Silvio René, a resident of the Havana municipality of Regla, is a babalawo. "My son is religious, a babalawo; the opportunity for this tourist trip came up for him, and he went," his mother explained. Although neither of the two families has direct contacts in Venezuela, the network of the young man's religious godchildren in the United States, Brazil, and Italy is trying to locate him from abroad.
Communication with the partner is impossible: having been in the country for only a week, they had not obtained a local phone line and were relying exclusively on WhatsApp through Olivia's Cuban number, which remains silent. "We have no one there, we are desperate," lamented the godmother.
Family members also denounce the opaque response of the Cuban regime. While searches for Cubans in Venezuela remain active and citizen platforms document more than 30 missing individuals with names and locations, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared on Saturday that it has no "official confirmation" of compatriots Injured, deceased, or missing.
"They published here that they are still unaware of any missing Cubans and have not provided any updates. The only thing they say is that the doctors, that the Cuban medical brigade is well, which is all they care about," Pérez López harshly criticized.
The regime insists that it has no confirmation of affected Cubans despite testimonies from relatives. Díaz-Canel stated this Sunday that he maintains "permanent contact" with Venezuelan authorities and the embassy in Caracas.
The case of Olivia and Silvio René is part of a larger tragedy: the double earthquake on June 24, with magnitudes of 7.2 and 7.5, is the most devastating recorded in Venezuela since 1900. The official toll stands at 1,450 dead and over 3,360 injured, while the UN estimates that up to 50,000 are missing across the country.
Olivia's godmother bitterly summarized the context that led the young woman to emigrate: "Here, the young people really are desperate. Everyone supported her leaving because, honestly, any place is better than this."
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