Photo: RL Hevia (reference image)
Text: Fede Gayardo
The news of corruption in state institutions in recent times seems to be non-stop in Cuba. Now, a scandal has become known for this reason in the Guillermón Moncada port, in Santiago de Cuba.
According to information shared by the state media Cubadebate, “multiple actors” were involved in it.
The note adds that among those involved are officials and port workers, as well as cargo companies and transporters.
These people “diverted basic products from the city’s port,” adds the text, where it was also learned that the authorities recovered more than 60 tons of food and are prosecuting 78 people involved in total.
The investigative process also resulted in the seizure of large quantities of illegally imported food, such as rice, beans, sugar and flour.
Likewise, during it, criminal conduct related to embezzlement, falsification of documents and reception was detected, which entails penalties of up to 20 years in prison for those involved.
The aforementioned media stressed that the country’s authorities emphasized “the importance of combating corruption and protecting products destined for the people, in which popular surveillance and state administrations play a key role.”
Precisely this Monday, the Comptroller General of Cuba, Gladys Bejerano, recognized in an interview with EFE that the current situation in Cuba has caused an increase in corruption because “there is a greater need” and scarcity “of everything”, although this is not a justification. .
According to him, 76% of the illegalities detected occur “at the grassroots level” and reaffirmed that “people do not fall into corruption by parachute. It is a process: corruption is decomposition. It is a process of loss of values, of self-esteem, of self-respect.”
Regarding the control systems in the country, he added that 23% have deficiencies, mainly due to lack of technical or human capabilities, since only 60% of the positions in the Comptroller General’s Office are filled.
In her words, the Comptroller also mentioned the case of former Deputy Prime Minister and former Minister of Economy Alejandro Gil, which she described as a “betrayal.”
This would be the first time that a senior Cuban leader speaks about this event, one of the largest defenestrations in recent times on the island.
Regarding it, Bejerano stated that “it hurts and it hurts a lot because one thinks as a colleague that a person who has been at that level, who has been handling the situations, the sacrifices that have had to be made…That does not have an attitude in correspondence, One really feels it as a betrayal, as something that is not right, and that is how we all feel. But there is morality and there is courage to face it.”
