Marino Murillo Jorge, the official who designed the Ordering Task and currently presides over Tabacuba, was spotted leisurely strolling through the Plaza de España in Madrid on Saturday, according to images sent to the newsroom of Diario de Cuba.
In the photographs, Murillo—identifiable by his salmon-colored polo shirt, sturdy build, and graying hair—walks through the commercial streets of downtown Madrid with the same calmness that is scarce on the island he left, which is mired in an unresolvable economic crisis.
In one of the images, he is accompanied by Carlos Luis Jorge Méndez, the First Deputy Minister of Foreign Trade and Foreign Investment, who walks in front of the group. This is the same official who flanked Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro —known as "El Cangrejo"— during his first public media appearance in June of this year before The National.
Diario de Cuba pointed out with irony that the "casual presence in Spain contrasts with the deep crisis left by its economic reforms in Cuba," and wondered if Murillo had attended the concert of Silvio Rodríguez at the Madrid Arena, held on those same dates.
Murillo was the main architect of the monetary reform in January 2021, which unified the dual currency, eliminated subsidies, and reformed prices and wages. The result was rampant inflation that eroded the purchasing power of Cubans.
In October of that year, Murillo acknowledged before the National Assembly that one of the main deviations of the reform was the excessive increase in the prices of the basic basket.
Shortly before, in April 2021, he had been removed from the Political Bureau of the Communist Party. Months later, the regime "recycled" him as president of Tabacuba, a position he has held to this day.
The Madrid walk of Murillo arrives at a particularly delicate moment for the sector it oversees. The Festival del Habano —an annual luxury event organized by Habanos S.A. and Tabacuba— was canceled in February of this year due to the energy crisis, with no new date announced. It had already been postponed in 2024 for the same reason.
The 2025 edition, which did take place, sparked a wave of outrage due to the contrast between luxury humidor auctions, exclusive dinners, and the so-called "Midnight Night" at the Capitol in Havana, while the population endured daily blackouts of more than 20 hours.
The ruler Miguel Díaz-Canel was caught smoking tobacco at the luxurious auction of the event, and Silvio Rodríguez himself publicly denounced the loss of national dignity in reference to the ostentation of the festival.
The problems faced by the sector are compounded by the recent exit of British American Tobacco from Cuba, announced this week, which further exacerbates the situation for an industry that is already dealing with obsolete machinery that is between 70 and 85 years old, a shortage of supplies, and the aftermath of Hurricane Ian in 2022 on the plantations of Pinar del Río.
Madrid has become a recurring destination for figures associated with the Cuban regime, who frequent the Spanish capital while the island's population grapples with food shortages and other basic necessities, power outages, and an unprecedented wave of emigration.
The images of Murillo and Jorge Méndez walking through the streets of downtown Madrid add a new chapter to the pattern of privileges that the Cuban nomenclatura enjoys away from the cameras—and away from Cuba.
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