The Cuban regime restored the electricity supply in the Havana neighborhood of El Fanguito just a few hours after residents blocked Avenida 23 on Wednesday night, following over 48 hours without electricity, water, or gas.
The protest, captured on video, was shared on his social media by the rapper and activist Eliécer Márquez Duany, known as "El Funky." In the footage, an officer from the MININT and several policemen can be seen trying to calm the protesters amid shouts and boos, while the residents refused to back down.
The regime's response was immediate and calculated: a lineman from the Electric Union climbed a pole, opened a hatch at the top, manipulated its interior, and restored power to the area, which activists interpret as a maneuver to demobilize the protest without addressing its underlying causes.
The episode once again highlights a pattern recurring in Cuba: citizen protests do not resolve the structural crisis of the National Electric System, but they often compel immediate responses from the authorities, who are driven by the fear that the demonstrations may spread.
These solutions, however, tend to be temporary and do not address the underlying causes of the prolonged blackouts that affect the population.
A protester confronted a driver who was trying to break through the blockade: "Turn around, turn around, we've been without electricity for over 24 hours! There are children here crying! Turn around, turn around!"
El Funky also reported in his post that the electricity in El Fanguito was being diverted to supply only eight houses on the same block: "They are stealing the electricity to leave it for eight houses on the same block, and it’s worth mentioning that one of those houses is where the minister of public health, whose last name is Portal Miranda, lives."
The mentioned minister, José Ángel Portal Miranda, was sanctioned by the United States on July 23 for his association with the Cuban medical missions system, according to the Department of the Treasury. The activist's allegations regarding the official could not be verified by this editorial team.
The blockade of Avenida 23 has a significant symbolic impact: it is one of the main arteries of Havana, and its closure forces the authorities to respond in the heart of the city. The residents of El Fanguito closed the road after their complaints and waits received no response from the State.
El Fanguito is one of the most precarious settlements in Havana, located along the Almendares River in the Plaza de la Revolución municipality. Most of its homes are informal structures built with makeshift materials. According to the magazine El Estornudo, as of 2016, nearly 200 of its homes were not listed in the census, and only one was officially recognized by the State, highlighting decades of institutional neglect.
The protest is part of a wave of mobilizations that has intensified throughout July, marking the most extensive in Havana since July 11, 2021. In July, there were three total collapses of the National Electroenergetic System in less than eight days, with outages lasting up to 87 consecutive hours in some provinces.
This same pattern of tactical concession had already been seen on July 26, when the regime kept neighborhoods in Havana illuminated on the eve of a national call for a pans-banging protest, an action interpreted by activists as a maneuver to demobilize the protests.
This Thursday, protests with pots and pans were reported in Santiago de Cuba for the same reason, while the Electric Union had forecasted a deficit of 2,380 MW on Wednesday, equivalent to leaving 74% of the island without electricity simultaneously at peak demand.
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