A Cuban State Security agent was recorded on video threatening residents of the Havana neighborhood El Fanguito with identifying and arresting those who posted images of his presence on social media.
During a visit made following the protests on Thursday on Avenida 23, the oppressor gathered a group of neighbors on the street to intimidate and coerce them to prevent such demonstrations and road closures from recurring in the capital.
The video, shared on social media by the rapper and activist Eliécer Márquez Duany, better known as «El Funky», shows an officer interrupting a mother who was describing the situation of the children in the neighborhood —«sleeping on top of their mothers, without food, without anything, without bread»— to warn those present about the consequences of documenting his actions.
"I am from Security. I know who uploaded the photo, even if it was sent to a relative abroad and that relative uploaded it. I can trace the link, whatever it takes, the IP address, whatever I have. I can find whatever I need, and then I come and look for it," the agent declared to the gathered neighbors.
The officer tried to establish a legal distinction to justify his threats: "Look, recording is not a crime. But I am a public official and you commit a crime when you publish me on social media without my authorization and without my consent. Are we clear?"
Demonstrating understanding of the community's discomfort, the agent referred to the case of two linemen detained in Calabazar, Boyeros, who were arrested on July 17 accused of illegally selling electricity to private businesses while the area was experiencing blackouts. However, he insisted that the protests and the people's outrage made it difficult for him to investigate whether the linemen in the area were also corrupt, as the neighbors had apparently reported.
"The investigative process is ongoing. But I am not going to catch the linemen in any wrongdoing here [...] because you have them threatened. [...] The [linemen] from Boyeros are imprisoned," said the agent in an attempt to calm the neighbors and redirect their discontent towards workers who are supposedly under investigation.
The repression was not limited to verbal threats. In another post on Facebook, Márquez Duany stated that State Security agents detained two mothers at the police station on Zapata and C. One of them was identified as María Yilian Franco Díaz, who was taken to the station along with her four-year-old son, José Luis Navarro.
The repressive pattern followed the sequence already documented in other protests: a few hours after the blockade on Avenida 23, the regime restored electricity in El Fanguito —a maneuver that activists interpret as a tactic to demobilize the protest without addressing its underlying causes— and shortly thereafter, the arrests began.
In Nuevitas, Camagüey, in 2022, State Security launched a crackdown against those who participated in or disseminated information about the protests, involving arrests, summons, and interrogations.
Among the most well-known cases is that of Mayelín Rodríguez Prado, arrested after live-streaming the police repression and sentenced to 15 years in prison for documenting the protests in that area.
The young mother was subsequently showcased by the official spokesperson Humberto López in a video of self-incrimination broadcasted by state television, used as a public deterrent against the protesters.
In June, agents threatened the activist Manuel Cuesta Morúa with "to shoot him in the head" if he continued promoting pot-banging protests.
Repression has left a measurable trace: Cubalex recorded almost 2,000 repressive actions in the first half of 2026, and in July, there were at least 24 arrests following a protest in Luyanó and four arrests in Sibanicú, Camagüey, after a protest for water and electricity.
Protests in El Fanguito erupted after the neighborhood endured more than 48 hours without electricity, water, or gas, amid the worst energy crisis in Cuba's history, with deficits that have left 74% of the island without electricity during peak demand.
Filed under: