Sawt Falasteen - Blackout drags on for second day in Cuba

At dawn, most neighborhoods in Havana were dark, except for hotels and hospitals with emergency generators and the very few private homes with that kind of backup in this economically challenged island nation that has grown accustomed to periodic power outages.

The capital Havana came to a virtual standstill Friday at midday as schools closed, public transport ground to a halt and traffic lights stopped functioning.

The power grid collapsed in a chain reaction due to the unexpected shutdown of the Antonio Guiteras power plant, the biggest of the island's eight decrepit coal-fired power plants, said the head of electricity supply at the energy ministry, Lazaro Guerra.

The national electric utility UNE said that on Friday night it had managed to generate a minimal amount of power to get those plants running again and start to bring things back to normal.

But at 6:15 a.m. "a new, total disconnection of the electrical grid occurred," said the official news outlet Cubadebate.

"Everything is very difficult. For almost a day we have had this blackout that makes life so hard for us," said Yaima Vallares, a 28-year-old dancer.

"I am trying to remain calm because there is too much stress over everything in this country," she told AFP.

Isabel Rodriguez, 72, said shorter outages were common in Cuba and her house often had no water. "Believe me, it is hard to live like this."

The blackout followed weeks of power outages, lasting up to 20 hours a day in some provinces, which prompted Prime Minister Manuel Marrero on Thursday to declare an "energy emergency."

The government on Thursday suspended all nonessential public services in order to prioritize electricity supply to homes.

Schools across the country have now been closed until Monday. Authorities in Havana said hospitals and other essential facilities, which are powered by generators, would remain open.

"This is crazy," Eloy Fon, an 80-year-old retiree living in central Havana, told AFP on Friday.

"It shows the fragility of our electricity system... We have no reserves, there is nothing to sustain the country, we are living day-to-day."

- 'They've messed up' -

For three months, Cubans have been battling chronic blackouts as they became longer and more frequent.

President Miguel Diaz-Canel said on X Friday that the government would "not rest" until the lights were back on.

He blamed the situation on Cuba's difficulties in acquiring fuel for its power plants, which he attributed to the tightening, during the Donald Trump presidency, of a six-decade-long US trade embargo.

- Worst crisis in 30 years -

Cuba is in the throes of its worst economic crisis since the collapse of the Soviet Union, a key ally in the early 1990s -- marked by sky-high inflation and shortages of food, medicine, fuel and even water.

With no relief in sight, many Cubans have emigrated.

More than 700,000 entered the United States between January 2022 and August 2024, according to US officials.

While the authorities chiefly blame the US embargo, the island is also feeling the aftershocks of the Covid-19 pandemic battering its critical tourism sector, and of economic mismanagement.

To bolster its grid, Cuba has leased seven floating power plants from Turkish companies and also added many small diesel-powered generators.

In July 2021, blackouts sparked an unprecedented outpouring of public anger.

Thousands of Cubans took to the streets shouting, "We are hungry" and "Freedom!" in a rare challenge to the government.

One person was killed and dozens were injured in the protests. According to the Mexico-based human rights organization Justicia 11J, 600 people detained during the unrest remain in prison.

In 2022, the island also suffered months of daily hours-long power outages, capped by a nationwide blackout on September 27 caused by Hurricane Ian.

F.Qawasmeh--SF-PST