Two panels from the photovoltaic system installed in a telephone cabinet of the Telecommunications Company ETECSA in the Santa Bárbara neighborhood, Santiago de Cuba, were stolen early Saturday morning, an incident that left nearly 900 users of phone and data services without energy backup.
According to a report by Luis Enrique Torres Almarales on Facebook, Group Head in the Investment Department of ETECSA in the province, the affected cabinet is located on Calle 5, between Enramadas and Escario, next to the primary school Miguel Ángel Cano, known as "la 45."
"Photovoltaic system that provided backup and continuity to the telephone services of nearly 900 customers, in the difficult energy situation our country is experiencing," wrote Torres Almarales, who posted photos showing the metal support structure with the missing panels.
Although he did not identify the thieves, he emphasized that everyone knows who they are: "Those young people and not so young, who are unemployed, hanging out on the corners, playing, with time to think about making money more easily since they feel invincible."
The executive noted that he had never seen so much crime in Cuba before: indiscipline, thefts, and violence, amidst a widespread apathy.
"Thieves and murderers openly stab to steal a phone or a scooter; they have no respect for the life or property of anyone. In the end, they do it because they know they are going to a penitentiary for a vacation, a break, where society, which they despise and destroy, takes care of and feeds them," he criticized.
The official also called for the reinstatement of the old "vagrancy law," which applied to those who did not work. "Today, there are many who have no job connection and want to live like princes, sleeping during the day and going out at night, living off of other people's inventions."
And he went further by demanding the implementation of the death penalty: "I believe that the death penalty must be reinstated; there can be no more considerations for those who refuse to work, living off theft and murdering the working people."
"People are feeling panic, and it's not fair that this is happening. (...) It's time to take real action, seriously, the speeches are no longer enough," concluded Torres Almarales in his post.
Last week, this engineer reported stone vandalism against the solar panels of the photovoltaic system installed in the telephone cabinet number two of the Flores neighborhood, located in the courtyard of the School of Arts and Crafts in Santiago de Cuba.
The photos accompanying the complaint posted on Facebook showed a stone on the solar panels mounted on an elevated metal structure, surrounded by barbed wire and chain-link fencing.
"We are witnessing a pure act of sabotage, a malicious action aimed at causing damage and harm to the little we can achieve for the benefit of society," stated Torres Almarales on that occasion.
Santiago de Cuba has experienced a series of attacks on its photovoltaic telecommunications infrastructure this year: on May 1, a panel was stolen from the Micro 9-2 Integrated Cabinet, leaving over 560 users without service. On the 30th of that month, four panels disappeared from the Flores neighborhood cabinet. A few days later, on June 6, another four were stolen from the Micro 7 neighborhood.
The pattern is repeated throughout the Island. In Matanzas, three individuals were arrested at the beginning of September for stealing 28 panels intended for water pumping in Los Arabos, of which only 21 were recovered.
In Las Tunas, similar robberies targeted pumping stations and ETECSA cables in Amancio. In Holguín, four individuals assaulted and tied up the security guard of a station to steal 32 panels. In Jovellanos, Matanzas, this week a man was arrested after climbing onto a roof and stealing a solar panel, with a history of similar offenses.
Despite the fact that the Supreme Popular Court issued Opinion 475 in May 2025, which classifies these thefts as sabotage with sentences of up to 30 years, life imprisonment, or the death penalty in aggravated cases, the authorities initiated more than 460 criminal investigations for offenses against the electrical system between 2025 and the first half of 2026.
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