Cuban citizens in Marianao, Havana, peacefully protested this week to denounce blackouts, hunger, and neglect under the communist regime, defying recent threats by figurehead “President” Miguel Díaz-Canel against dissidents, Martí Noticias reported on Wednesday.
September marked the month with the most protests in Cuba in 2025 so far, according to the Cuban Observatory for Human Rights (OCDH), a non-governmental organization. OCDH documented 1,121 known protests in September, almost 100 protests more than the 1023 documented during August.
The organization further reported that it documented 323 incidents in which the protesters challenged Cuban state police officers “bold enough to provoke a repressive reaction,” including instances of pot-banging, street blockades, and heated discussions with the officers. OCDH logged 152 known instances of regime repression in September, up from 89 in August.
“Anger over endless blackouts and the increasingly critical lack of running water led to hundreds of complaints about public services, and repression intensified once again against political prisoners, opponents, activists, and members of civil society in general. Reports of public insecurity saw an alarming doubling in the number of deaths, disappearances, violence, and crime,” the report read.
Following several days of continuous blackouts and worsening running water shortages, Cubans in central Havana organized a protest, reportedly blocking roads, chanting “freedom” and other slogans, and lighting up a bonfire during the blackout.
Díaz-Canel responded to the protests on Saturday by threatening Cubans who demand electricity and water, claiming, “no one is authorized to close a public road.” The figurehead “president” demanded that any citizens’ complaints must instead be made at “established places” such as Cuban Communist Party offices. Díaz-Canel issued the threats during his participation in a purported “garbage collection” campaign in Havana.
Cuban citizens condemned Díaz-Canel’s threats, reportedly describing them as “out of place” and a form of “population control.”
“I have been going to the Party and the Government for four years to explain my situation, and I have never received a response. That mechanism he proposes for serving the population doesn’t work here. It’s just to keep you under control, but in the end, they’re not going to help you or give you an answer,” Cuban national Yanan Camaraza Medina told Martí Noticias.
Martí Noticias reported on Wednesday that residents of the Havana municipality of Marianao defied Diáz-Canel’s threats and flocked to the streets during a blackout on Tuesday to demand “electricity, food, and freedom.” Dozens of Cubans blocked access to Marianao’s Avenue 51 during the protest in defiance to the figurehead “president.” Witnesses reportedly denounced on social media that Cuban police officers arrived and detained several protesters.
Residents of Marianao spoke with the outlet Cubanet under condition of anonymity and narrated that the protest started after an over nine-hour-long blackout hit the municipality. One resident asserted that the regime restored electric power after the protesters banged pots.
“Yes, they closed the avenue at 51 and 88B. They banged pots and pans throughout the neighborhood, but as always, someone tipped them off and the police truck came. For four days, they had been turning the power on and off every 10 or 15 minutes, and today it had been off since two in the afternoon,” one of the residents told Cubanet.
“Since seven o’clock, when they turned on the power, they’ve cut it off four times. How can people not take to the streets? Today we were without power from two in the afternoon. It’s too much: the heat, the uncertainty. How long will this misfortune last? And to top it all off, we’ve been without internet almost all day,” another resident said.
Cubanet stated that Castro regime authorities have not issued any official statement on the Marianao protests or on possible arrests.
“The repression of protest is a profound blow to the principles of freedom of thought and expression. At ICLEP, we denounce the imposition of fear, physical aggression, and arrests of those who exercise their right to demand change in their reality,” the Miami-based Cuban Institute for Freedom of Expression and the Press (ICLEP) said on Wednesday.
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
Read the full article here