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Neighbors from Zones 9 and 11 of the neighborhood Alamar, in the municipality of East Havana, staged a pot-banging protest on Tuesday night and burned the trash accumulated in the street as a demonstration against the prolonged blackouts imposed by the Cuban regime, as documented by several Facebook profiles.
CubaFace Noticias reported that the pot-banging event took place around 10:00 p.m. local time during a power outage that lasted for hours.
The demonstration took place just a day after Cuba experienced its seventh total disconnection of the National Electric System in 18 months —the third one in 2026— with a deficit of 2,230 MW compared to an available capacity of only 1,000 MW.
The slogan “#Freedom” accompanied the publication of the video, where the sound of neighbors banging pots and pans could be heard.
Alamar is not a new stage for this type of protest. On March 23, 2026, there were already cacerolazos and burning of trash in the neighborhood, and on May 21, a night protest ended with police repression and at least one arrest.
The cacerolazo on Tuesday is part of a wave of protests that has shaken Cuba since March and reached its peak in June, when there were 107 street demonstrations across the country, nearly double the previous record of 54 in March, with 82 of them concentrated in Havana.
The slogans have escalated over the weeks: from "We want power!" to "Down with the dictatorship!" and "Freedom!", with "Homeland and Life" as the anthem of the protests.
In the first days of July, the protests have not ceased. On Monday, Cubans took to the streets in Jaimanitas after more than 24 hours without electricity, and this Wednesday, residents of shelters in Guanabacoa staged a casserole protest during the general blackout.
The energy crisis fueling these protests is structural: aging thermal power plants, fuel shortages, a lack of investment, and widespread deterioration of the electrical infrastructure, resulting from decades of mismanagement by the regime.
On Monday, the U.S. Embassy in Havana issued a security alert advising its citizens to prepare for prolonged outages due to the seriousness of the system collapse.
Analysts consider this wave of protests to be the most extensive since July 11, 2021, when thousands of Cubans took to the streets and the regime responded with mass repression and hundreds of arrests.
In some cases of the current protests, such as what happened in Playa in March, the authorities restored the electricity service minutes after the police presence, which the residents interpreted as a direct response to popular pressure.
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