Havana/“Long live May 2!” is the phrase impregnated with sarcasm that can be heard this Thursday in the Cuban streets. After the regime deployed its forces and multiple resources to guarantee that “more than four million Cubans” marched for Workers’ Day, the routine – which on the island translates into blackouts, lines and precarious transportation – has returned to normal. flood the streets.
The parade in Havana, the media epicenter of the event where most of the resources were concentrated, included allocations of buses, oil and electricity for loudspeaker systems in the midst of the crisis. In other provinces, however, spirits were diminished and it is the official press that is in charge this Thursday of writing headlines that claim the opposite.
“The propaganda this year in Holguín was half off,” he tells 14ymedio a state store worker who attended the parade. “Before, the city was filled with flags and posters with slogans that would then spend weeks lying in the streets or hanging half from power poles. But yesterday there were hardly any papers to be seen. None of the flags from before,” she says.
“I imagine that everyone who went to march yesterday has a power plant in their house, because I don’t conceive that people go out to march as if everything was fine.”
As for the gastronomic offer, “after the parade they sold beer dispensed by quantity, bad and watered down as always, in the parking lot of the Calixto García stadium,” he says. “The rest of the day was the same as always. As soon as the event was over, they put the first blackout in my neighborhood,” he laments.
With 464 megawatts (MW) of deficit during peak hours, according to the Electrical Union report, the blackouts on May 1 occurred, in addition to Holguín, in many other places on the Island. For this Thursday, availability is even worse, and almost 600 MW are expected to be missing. Cubans, who do not lose sight of the energy report, have begun to make conjectures. “The parade has already passed and the deficit has increased. What a coincidence,” a user responded to the UNE report on social networks. “This is compensation for yesterday’s parade,” said another Internet user.
In Lawton, Havana, the residents already received their first blackout this Thursday after the official ceremony at the Anti-imperialist Tribune. “I imagine that everyone who went to march yesterday has a power plant in their house, because I cannot conceive that people go out to march as if everything was fine and then arrive home to find that there is no water or they turned off the power,” comments Orestes, a resident of the municipality. “Not having housing and services in good condition despite working is a complaint that workers should make. But instead they go every May Day to walk for hours shouting slogans that no longer say anything to anyone,” he reflects.
Another problem has this Havana resident worried and that is that at the grocery store in his neighborhood the basic basket is increasingly delayed and has fewer products. “The last thing that arrived was the oil from January and February, plus two additional pounds of rice and two pounds of sugar from March. At this rate, I expect food from April in June and that’s how they want us to march, when there is no food.”
“People have too many problems to waste time on marches and speeches. Even more so when the country is like this, walking backwards like a crab.”
The island’s authorities reported on April 30 that they had just received a ship with imported milk that would last until May 10. Likewise, they announced that the delivery of soy yogurt to children between 7 and 14 years old, which had not been done since August 2023, had been resumed in the eastern provinces. The authorities mentioned in passing other products, such as meat, wheat flour or coffee, but in most cases deliveries are uncertain.
Thus, without improvements in the standard of living, working conditions or basic services, Cubans returned to their daily tasks this Thursday. The buses that yesterday transported soldiers and students to the Grandstand today disappeared again from the avenues, and the gastronomic offers recovered their astronomical prices.
At the Belascoaín and Carlos III post office, a mass of elderly people stood waiting to collect their pension. The conversation, started between those who have seen more than one May Day on the Island, reflects the discomfort of the Havana residents. “People have too many problems to waste time on marches and speeches. Even more so when the country is like this, walking backwards like a crab.”
