Thousands of Cubans marched on Havana's Malecon promenade and elsewhere on the island Sunday to protest food shortages and high prices amid the coronavirus crisis, in one of the biggest anti-government demonstrations in memory.
In the protests that saw many youngsters, people were calling for the resignation of President Miguel Diaz-Canel and an end to the Castro dictatorship. The protests disrupted traffic in the capital city of Havana. The march was broken by the police after several hours when protesters threw rocks.
Police initially trailed behind as protesters chanted Freedom, Enough and Unite. One motorcyclist pulled out a US flag, but it was snatched from him by others.
"We are fed up with the queues, the shortages. That's why I'm here,” one protester told AP.
Cuba is going through its worst economic crisis in decades, along with a resurgence of coronavirus cases, as it suffers the consequences of US sanctions imposed by the Trump administration. People are protesting the crisis-- food and medicine shortages and having to everything at the foreign currency stores.
People shouting "Freedom!" and "Down with Communism!" in a country with a strong communist hold like Cuba is unusual, as it could land one in jail. Demonstrators taking the risk of shouting such slogans indicates the level of frustration among the citizens. Cuba has been governed by the Communist Party of Cuba since 1965.
The Cuban economy, as a result of the effects of the pandemic and trade sanctions by the US, has contracted by 10.9 per cent in 2020 last year, and by 2 per cent through June of 2021. Cuba's economy is struggling. A contributing factor to having affected the economy is the decline of the tourism industry, which was affected due to the pandemic.
Sugar exports too, have suffered as this year's harvest has been much worse than expected, a BBC report reads.
Cuba reported a record of 6,923 cases of the coronavirus on Sunday. According to health officials, the surge in cases and hospitals being overwhelmed, as a result, is due to the arrival of the Delta variant. So far, 1.7 million of Cuba's 11.2 million residents have been fully vaccinated.
The demonstration grew to a few thousand in the vicinity of Galeano Avenue and the marchers pressed on despite a few charges by police officers and tear gas barrages.
An official in the Biden administration tweeted support for Sunday's demonstrations.
"Peaceful protests are growing in #Cuba as the Cuban people exercise their right to peaceful assembly to express concern about rising COVID cases/deaths & medicine shortages. We commend the numerous efforts of the Cuban people mobilizing donations to help neighbours in need,” tweeted Julie Chung, acting assistant secretary for state for Western Hemisphere affairs.
Cuba's director-general for US affairs, Carlos F. de Cossio, dismissed her remarks in his tweet: “US State Department and its officials, involved to their necks in promoting social and political instability in #Cuba, should avoid expressing hypocritical concern for a situation they have been betting on. Cuba is and will continue to be a peaceful country, contrary to the US.” At least 20 people were taken away in police cars or by individuals in civilian clothes.
"The people came out to express themselves freely, and they are repressing and beating them,” Reverand Jorge Luis Gil, a Roman Catholic priest, told AP while standing at a street corner in Centro Habana.
Authorities shut down internet service throughout the afternoon when several people tried to broadcast the protests live using their cellphones. People standing on many balconies along the central artery in the Centro Habana neighbourhood applauded the protesters passing by.
Demonstrations were also held elsewhere on the island, including the small town of San Antonio de los Banos, where people protested power outages and were visited by President Miguel Diaz-Canel. He entered a few homes, where he took questions from residents.
Afterwards, though, he accused Cubans of stirring up trouble.
“As if pandemic outbreaks had not existed all over the world, the Cuban-American mafia, paying very well on social networks to influencers and Youtubers, has created a whole campaign ... and has called for demonstrations across the country,” Diaz-Canel said.
"We are calling on all the revolutionaries in the country, all the Communists, to hit the streets wherever there is an effort to produce these provocations," Diaz-Canel added.
About 300 people close to the government arrived with a large Cuban flag shouting slogans in favour of the late President Fidel Castro and the Cuban revolution.
Diaz-Canel was named leader of the Communist Party in Cuba on April 19. After Fidel Castro's brother Raul Castro stepped down, Diaz-Canel is the first non-Castro to hold a prominent position in the Communist Party. Diaz-Canel is also the first Cuban born after the revolution to hold a position of power.
From 1959 till 2008, Cuba was under the authoritarian rule of Fidel Castro. Castro ruled as prime minister till 1976 and then as president from 1976 till 2008.
The US had been isolating Cuba with sanctions since the 1960s, which led to the communist system surviving for so long. In 2014, Raul Castro reached accords with the then US President Barack Obama in which led to the most extensive US opening to Cuba since the early 1960s. The surge in contacts with the US created a result that was largely reversed under Obama’s successor, Donald Trump.
--With PTI inputs
