Foreign students residing in the dormitories of the Faculty of Medicine in Santiago de Cuba staged a pot-banging protest this Saturday after enduring 24 consecutive hours without electricity, according to a video shared by independent journalist Yosmany Mayeta Labrada.
The audio from the video confirms the rhythmic banging of pots and pans in the dormitories where international students of the institution reside, joining the wave of protests that have been shaking the city for months.
This is not the first time that foreign students from that faculty have protested against the conditions on campus. In 2019, Congolese and South African students had already demonstrated due to poor food and power outages, which forced the regime to deploy a police operation in the area.
The episode is set against the backdrop of a energy crisis that has been affecting Santiago de Cuba for weeks. Since June 16, the local Electric Company has reorganized outages into nine blocks, leaving each area with barely one or two hours of electricity per day, a figure that even its own executives cannot guarantee.
The electricity generation deficit reached a historic high of 2,208 MW on June 25, leaving almost 70% of the country without simultaneous power.
Nine of the 16 thermoelectric units in Cuba are out of service, including the Antonio Guiteras plant, which has recorded its 17th failure so far in 2026.
The pot-banging protests in the eastern city have been ongoing for months. On July 2, nighttime demonstrations shook the Municipal neighborhood, the 18-story buildings, Santa Úrsula, Hoyo de Chicharrones, and the Portuondo neighborhood.
The regime responded by militarizing Santa Úrsula Park and, on June 29, deployed armed black berets with rifles in Chicharrones.
The protests also spread to Havana. Residents of La Lisa stood in front of the PCC headquarters after more than 50 hours without electricity or water; pot-banging in El Cerro triggered a heavy police operation, and dozens of residents in Regla took to the streets with the slogan: "We want to sleep with light; we want to live like people."
The Cuban Observatory of Conflicts recorded 1,311 protests in May 2026, the highest monthly figure known, and 1,133 in April, an increase of 29.5% compared to the previous year.
Far from providing solutions, Miguel Díaz-Canel responded to the protests on Friday in an interview with the Puerto Rican weekly Claridad with a phrase that sparked outrage.
"Tell the neighbors from the North to bang their pots, as they are the ones causing this blackout", stated the president who blamed the U.S. embargo while the structural energy collapse, a result of decades of poor government management, leaves millions of Cubans without electricity, water, or food.
Filed under: