Thousands of people took to the streets at several locations in Cuba including the capital Havana on Sunday to call for the end of the decades-old dictatorship and to demand food and vaccines as shortages of basic necessities have become commonplace and COVID-19 cases have soared in recent weeks.
From the Malecón, Havana’s famous boardwalk near the old city to small towns in Cienfuegos province and Palma Soriano, the largest city in Santiago de Cuba province, videos live-streamed on Facebook showed thousands of people walking and riding bikes and motorcycles along streets while chanting “Freedom,” “Down with Communism,” and “Homeland and Life,” which has become a battle cry among activists as it turns the revolutionary slogan “Homeland or Death” on its head.
“We are not afraid!” chanted Samantha Regalado while she recorded hundreds of people walking along a narrow street in Palma Soriano.
JUST IN – Mass protests erupt in several cities in #Cuba over the poor state of the socialized medical system. Protesters demand freedom from communist dictatorship.pic.twitter.com/NOSdVgP0By
— Disclose.tv 🚨 (@disclosetv) July 11, 2021
Incredible!
Hundreds of Cubans have gathered in front of a public monument to Raul Castro to protest and chant “LIBERTAD” (freedom). I have never seen anything like this. We’re witnessing history.#SOSCuba🇨🇺 pic.twitter.com/bw9Qz5VlXQ
— Giancarlo Sopo (@GiancarloSopo) July 11, 2021
Video streamed on Facebook by Antonio Miguel Cobas Jalowayski around 1 p.m. in Palma Soriano showed hundreds of protesters calling for freedom and shouting “down with the dictatorship” and “down with Díaz-Canel,” but also demanding medicine, vaccines and “the end of hunger.” A crowd is seen pushing a police car and shouting “the dictators just arrived,” in reference to the police. Later, one protester is heard saying, “this is a pacific demonstration.”
Facebook user Carlos Alberto Ceballos Brito published a video around the same time showing a crowd gathering in Alquizar, a town in Artemisa province, also protesting against the government and chanting “down with Diaz-Canel” and “Patria y Vida”. Another video published on Facebook shows a similar protest in nearby Guira de Melena. In all cases, the crowd used strong language to refer to President Miguel Díaz-Canel, whose popularity is sharply falling as life in the island deteriorates.
Cuba is in the throes of its worst economic contraction in over three decades as chronic inefficiencies and paralyzing bureaucracy have gradually eroded the country’s production capacity, including in the essential food ad agriculture sectors. Trump-era sanctions have reduced access to vital economic lifelines like remittances, and foreign investment has plunged. Painful currency reforms this year have sent inflation soaring, and long lines for food have again become commonplace.
Now Cuba is struggling to control transmission of the coronavirus and is setting record highs almost daily in the past few weeks. Cuba decided to make its own COVID-19 vaccine and didn’t seek to buy shots from other countries. But plans to vaccinate the population with a homegrown shot has been plagued by delays.
Earlier this week, calls for the government to accept humanitarian aid had increased as Cubans began documenting on social media the collapse of the health system in Matanzas, the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic in the island.
Wait, Cuba’s socialized medicine isn’t superior to that in the U.S., despite leftists lecturing us on this point incessantly? Imagine my shock.
This is impossible. Numerous bluecheck leftwing media personalities have assured us for years that #Cuba’s socialized medicine is far superior to our own…https://t.co/TFuJvqJepo
— BattleSwarm (@BattleSwarmBlog) July 11, 2021
The government responded by sending more doctors to that province and setting a bank account to receive aid, but the account is in a Cuban bank under US sanctions. Although Cuban officials said this week the country is open for donations, historically, the government has refused or seized the humanitarian aid coming from Cuban exiles.
In a separate video posted on Facebook on Sunday, activist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara called on Cubans to head to the Malecón boardwalk to gather in protest against the island’s authoritarian regime.
“I’m going to the street, I’m going to the Malecón, no matter the cost,” he said.
Otero Alcántara went on hunger strike earlier this year to draw international attention to increased repression of artists and activists, who have stepped up calls for more civil liberties. He was forcibly removed from his home and hospitalized.
Later in the afternoon, Cubans were sharing videos of the police response. A Facebook video posted by user AntenaCubana shows people in Palma Soriano throwing stones at the police while a person is heard saying the police had been beating the demonstrators.
Speaking of the police:
🚨BREAKING🚨
Cuba’s communist regime is mobilizing its infamous Black Berets to shut down the uprising that is currently underway across the island. This is going to get violent.
Stand with the Cuban people. Demand their freedom now! #SOSCuba🇨🇺pic.twitter.com/FeDklxkksp
— Giancarlo Sopo (@GiancarloSopo) July 11, 2021
It would be great to see ordinary Cubans overthrow the Communist dictatorship, but we’ve seen mass protests in communist countries peter out before (such as in Venezuela). Also, the Obama Administration retreads in the Biden Administration will hardly be enthusiastic about helping the Cuban people overthrow the regime Obama famously cuddled-up to.
Funny how Obama and company never sought to stage a “color revolution” in Cuba, isn’t it?