Millions of Cubans left in darkness

The national electric grid had collapsed, first on Friday, and twice on Saturday, and it plunged large parts of Cuba into darkness. “Tonight at 10.25 pm the total disconnection of the national electro energetic system occurred again,” said the Havana Electric Company in a social media post late on Saturday. The post was removed but power was not restored on Sunday.

The disconnection was due to the shutting down of the largest power plant in the country. Many reasons are being stated for the breakdown. Among them, the old infrastructure, fuel shortages and the increase in demand. The shutdown was preceded by acute power shortage, and the government had closed schools and non-essential industrial units, sent children and workers home to save power. And it culminated in the shutdown of the power plant. Cuba’s energy ministry confessed, “The process of reestablishing the electrical system continues to be complex.” The Cuban government also blames the power troubles on the trade embargo enforced by the United States since the days of Donald Trump as president.

Cuba remains a communist party-ruled state, even after the weakening of the rule of Fidel Castro and then his brother Raul Castro when the communists took over the government in 1959. And the country had withstood decades of sabotage by neighbouring Big Brother, the United States, which was ideologically opposed to communist Cuba. There were many attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro, and in 1961 an attempt to invade Cuba, which is now known as the Bay of Pigs fiasco. But ever since the fall of communism in Russia in 1991, Cuba became more isolated than ever, though left-leaning governments in South America in Venezuela, and in Brazil stood by it. But that did not solve Cuba’s economic problems.

There are three official communist states in the world – China, Vietnam and Cuba. The first two have adopted market strategies to stimulate economic growth, and encouraged private enterprise. Cuba has not been able to do that. And there could be genuine reasons behind it. If Cuba were to open its economy, it could be swamped by the American-backed Cuban exiles in the US, and they would not be content to dominate the economy, they would also want to undermine the political authority and legitimacy of the communist party in the country. So, Cuba faces the difficult task of retaining the gains it had made in terms of health and education under the communist regime and at the same time create jobs for the people. And all this it has to do in the face of a still hostile United States.

Cuba is still a prominent member of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), which has a large number of developing countries in Africa, Asia and Central and South America as members. And there is a certain bonding among the developing countries. Cuba is then not completely isolated. But its leaders will have to chart an innovative path to take the country forward. It would be simplistic to put the blame of all the social and economic ills that Cuba is facing at the door of communism. Compared to many other countries in Central and South America, Cuba had over the decades built a people-friendly infrastructure. But this needs to be renewed. It cannot stay in the times when it was created – in the 1960s and 1970s. Fidel Castro’s charismatic leadership and the communist party’s dictatorial suppression might have kept the problems of Cuba hidden. But now they are spilling out. What is needed is an honest assessment by the Cuban leaders as to course correction they have to make to take Cuba out of the crises of the kind created by the power shortage.