Cuba suffers a national blackout and has declared itself an “energy emergency” due to the collapse of the electrical system.

Thursday, October 17, was the darkest day in Cuba in all of 2024. The population began to complain on social networks and demand the “resignation” of their leaders. The state power company, La Union Electrica, confirmed that more than half of Cubans were without electricity service. Without being able to sweep under the rug the darkness in which the island lives, like a black hole in the middle of the Caribbean Sea, its government clearly recognized: that the country is going through an “energy emergency” due to which Closing of schools at all teaching levels and suspending cultural and recreational activities to give priority to hospitals and food processing centres. This Friday the situation worsened and the Ministry of Energy and Mines reported that at 11 a.m. “the national electroenergy system completely shut down.” As of noon, Cuba was still “in the process of restoring” the blackout.

President Miguel Diaz-Canel ordered his officials Thursday night to inform people about the “complex scenario” and said there was no immediate solution, not even in the medium term or until 2025. Cubans waited patiently until 8:30 pm to hear officials explain that the situation was remarkably serious, but the country was not in a “bottomless abyss.” Prime Minister Manuel Marrero said the three main factors affecting power generation losses are “the state of infrastructure, fuel shortages and demand growth.”

Although disconnections and breakdowns are becoming more frequent in an aging thermoelectric system completely without the resources to maintain it, Marrero highlighted that fuel shortages are the biggest problem causing Cubans to live almost completely in the dark. Are. Recently, the country – which is usually not sufficiently clear about the amount of fuel it receives or stops – noticed a decrease in the arrival of oil coming from its main trading partners such as Mexico, Russia or Venezuela. And it is true that it does not have foreign exchange to import. Díaz-Canel has said, as he usually does, that the main reason is the “economic war” and the “financial and energy oppression of the United States” towards Cuba, which “imports the fuel and other resources it needs.” Makes it difficult.” Industry.” .

Although they did not provide details, officials said Thursday that the government plans to “maximize Cuba’s oil production” and increase the use of renewable energy sources. Marrero explains that the solution to the crisis involves “eliminating dependence on fossil fuels, replacing it with clean energy.” At the moment they have imposed “extraordinary measures” that disrupt most activities and the normal course of life on the island.

At her home in Sagua la Grande, in the center of Cuba, Katia Ojeda not only did not have electricity to watch television and know what to tell authorities about a power outage that lasted more than 15 hours, but she also lost her Didn’t listen. I have stopped watching any kind of news and information programs. “They are lies, and worse than that, it’s better not to see them,” he says. Ojeda believes the fact that he spends more than half his day amid blackouts is “outrageous.” ” Is. “They turn on the lights for an hour or two, whenever they want, during the day or at dawn,” he says. In those two hours, he rushes to prepare as much food as he can because he knows how. That there will be very little electricity.

At the beginning of this energy crisis, Ojeda says they cut off her power for six hours, then it went down to eight hours, and now it’s out of hand. Following an announcement from the Ministry of Education that teaching activities were suspended, her 12-year-old daughter, like almost all students in the country, stopped going to school.

Madeleine Cordero’s two children are also not going to school in Cruces, Cienfuegos province. “Life in Cuba has become unbearable. It’s very sad to see my children living in this situation, I can’t even give them a glass of cold water right now,” says Cordero. “Yesterday we had electricity for only two hours, from 8 to 10 pm, and today we are in blackout, classes were suspended in schools. “The situation in the residential sector should have improved, but we have not seen any improvement. On the contrary, what has been said is that the blackout will last for 24 hours.”

The government announced that what little power it has will be used to prioritize the residential sector, and plans to increase payment rates for the non-state sector, which has seen a decline in small and medium-sized businesses in recent years. Has increased with authority. Companies or MSMEs to provide oxygen to the island’s economy.

Without promising otherwise, officials said they expected this energy crisis to last more than two years. The situation, which has become acute and compounded by shortages of food, health services, education, and the decline of almost all sectors of Cuban society, has not only generated the largest migrant exodus in the country’s history, but it has also transformed Cubans do not take to the streets with pans to demand. In the month of August alone, the Cuban Conflict Observatory (OCC) recorded approximately 700 protests throughout the country, most of which were related to dissatisfaction over services such as electricity, water, sanitation or transportation.