The First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba in Ciego de Ávila, Julio Gómez Casanova, attributed the halt of garbage collection services for over 10 days in the provincial capital to the U.S. embargo, announcing this Sunday that solid waste collection efforts had resumed the day before.
In a post on Facebook, the official stated that the interruption was due to "a lack of fuel - a direct consequence of the U.S. blockade -" and announced that during the week, priority would be given to the most affected areas, with the support of several entities that will join CostÁvila Pdl full-time, a Local Development Project created to manage solid waste collection, street sweeping, and the maintenance of green spaces.
"We urge the community to join in the cleaning and maintenance efforts in their neighborhoods. Keeping the city clean is the responsibility of everyone," stated the party leader of the central territory.
The reaction in the comments of the post was one of open skepticism. One citizen summarized the sentiment of many with a terse "Don't be shameless," while another attributed the resumption of the service not to official management but to citizen pressure: "Thanks to the pressure from social media, the garbage is being collected."
Another comment pointed to a double responsibility: "Aside from poor management, people do not cooperate by dumping waste anywhere."
There were also those who demanded that the available fuel be delivered to the municipality of Ciro Redondo, which is similarly affected, and those who reported that the start of the school year forces children from nearby schools to walk through streets still covered in waste.
The justification for the embargo as a cause does not withstand scrutiny in context. The garbage collection crisis in Cuba is a structural problem that has progressively worsened since 2023 and affects the entire island.
In recent days, it has been possible to see streets buried under garbage in Artemisa due to the halt of garbage collection trucks, a landfill in a residential area of Santa Clara that had not been collected for 102 days, as well as the Ancón beach in Trinidad, which ended the summer season covered in waste.
In Havana, central areas are buried under mountains of waste that obstruct both vehicle and pedestrian traffic, as well as posing health risks.
The official press acknowledged in April the existence of over 150 illegal dumpsites in the city of Avilés and announced a sweeping plan covering more than 200 kilometers of streets, without this leading to any visible improvements.
Days earlier, a Cuban resident abroad reported large piles of trash in front of the Guiñol Theatre, in the heart of the City of Portals.
Gómez has a documented pattern of attributing the province's problems to the embargo. In July, he stated that the lack of electricity, water, transportation, food, and connectivity are "direct consequences" of the embargo and the "energy blockade" by the United States government, in a speech reported by the official newspaper Granma.
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