Miguel Díaz-Canel has set a date for the improvement of water supply in Havana: the end of September.
The leader assures that by then results should start to be seen in two or three of the main supply systems and that during October other sources would be consolidated, with solutions based on renewable energies before the end of the year, according to the Presidency website.
The date deserves to be taken seriously, but not because Díaz-Canel has earned reasons for trust. On the contrary: after eight years of promises, corrections, plans, and timelines that have rarely produced the announced results, the end of September may become a concrete test of his credibility.
The question is no longer what the ruler has promised. It is much simpler: What reason do Cubans have to believe him this time?
A crisis too deep to be resolved with another promise
The situation that the new plan seeks to address is not temporary. More than half a million residents of Havana suffered from water issues in July, following about 200,000 affected in April and over 376,000 in May. Nationwide, around 2.7 million Cubans are facing difficulties in accessing water regularly.
The crisis is not solely dependent on rainfall or the condition of the reservoirs. About 87% of Havana's pumping system relies on electricity, while the infrastructure has been suffering from decades of deterioration. Pipes that have been in use for 60 to 70 years, losses of between 40% and 70% of the pumped water, and deteriorated pumping equipment are part of the problem.
The government now intends to respond with generator sets for 29 supply sources, repairs, and, subsequently, solar generation and storage systems. However, it has not yet provided information on the cost of the program, how much fuel will be required, or how many residents should regain stable service to consider the first phase completed.
This makes the September deadline significant, but also limited: a date is not a solution and an installation does not equate to a result.
Electricity: promises that piled up as blackouts worsened
The relationship between water and electricity makes the new announcement particularly concerning.
Díaz-Canel acknowledges that hydraulic systems require between ten and twelve continuous hours of electrical stability to function properly. However, electricity is precisely one of the areas where the government has promised a recovery that never materialized.
Since 2019, Díaz-Canel has spoken about overcoming power outages, stabilizing the system, recovering thermal power plants, incorporating new generation, and transforming the energy matrix.
In 2021, he had to request that the population be informed about when "the undesirable blackout" would arrive. In 2022, the government promised to minimize blackouts before the end of the year. By 2024, after once again focusing on repairs and maintenance, Díaz-Canel stated: "We need to provide power to our population before the end of the year."
The result was not a sustained recovery. In 2024, there were national disconnections and new fuel crises; by 2026, the deficits of the National Electric System had exceeded 2,000 megawatts, and in some areas, blackouts lasted almost the entire day.
This is the immediate precedent to the promise regarding water: the same government that for years failed to ensure the necessary electricity for pumping now claims it will be able to guarantee water precisely through solutions that depend on equipment, fuel, investments, and energy.
The pattern repeats
Electricity is no exception. It is the most visible example of a larger issue: the gap between what Díaz-Canel says, what his government does, and what ultimately happens.
In terms of food, the government acknowledged in 2020 the failure to meet its goals for rice, beans, and pork. In 2022, Díaz-Canel admitted that in Cuba there was "no food, no livestock, and no fish" and, nonetheless, years later, he insisted again that "we will eat what we are able to produce".
In the economy, the promise of recovery has not materialized either. Estimates cited by CiberCuba place the real GDP for 2025 at more than 15% below the level of 2018.
Tourism, touted as one of the main engines of the country, ended 2025 with barely 1.81 million international tourists and a hotel occupancy rate of 18.9%. The Minister of Economy acknowledged that exports had only met 62% of the plan.
It's not necessary to turn each of those pieces of data into an isolated accusation. Together, they reveal something more significant: eight years later, the government continues to announce solutions for problems it had already promised to solve.
Currency stores: when reality contradicts the narrative
The case of the MLC stores offers another example of the disconnect between discourse and reality.
In 2020, Díaz-Canel denied that Cuba would dollarize and stated that stores in CUP and CUC would continue. The initial foreign currency stores were presented as a concrete measure to attract resources and support the economy.
Then something very different happened: the network expanded, basic goods began to shift into these circuits, establishments appeared directly in dollars, and the government itself acknowledged the existence of a "partial dollarization".
Meanwhile, CiberCuba has documented the expansion of stores that operate exclusively in dollars, as well as the shortages in MLC establishments.
The lesson is not that a measure cannot change. It is that what is announced is one thing, what is done is another, and what the population ultimately experiences is yet another.
From "prosperity" to the 176 measures
In 2018, upon assuming the Presidency, Díaz-Canel promised to move towards a "prosperous and sustainable socialism" and assured that there would be no "capitalist turns" in Cuba.
Eight years later, the government has had to resort to a package of 176 economic measures that expands the scope for private activity, foreign investment, and various market mechanisms.
It is not necessary to determine here whether that change means abandoning socialism or not. The point is different: the same ruler who promised prosperity ended up having to profoundly modify the economic rules because reality did not deliver the promised prosperity.
That is the context in which the promise of water now arrives.
The true test will be the outcome
Therefore, by the end of September, it should not be evaluated based on the number of installed generators, the meetings held, or the repairs announced. The assessment should be much simpler.
How many habaneros recover water? For how many hours? With what regularity? How many stations operate reliably? What happens when the National Electric System fails again?
Those are the indicators that will tell us if the plan is working. Everything else belongs to the realm of discourse.
Díaz-Canel has stated that it is necessary to “reinvent the entire water supply management system.” That may be true. But that statement also contains an acknowledgment: the system that the government has been managing for decades has reached a point where it needs to be reinvented.
After years of promises regarding electricity, food, growth, salaries, tourism, and basic services, the issue is no longer about what the leader announces. It is about deciding how much credit his word deserves.
At the end of September, the first response will arrive. It will not come from Díaz-Canel. It will come from the faucet.
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