Cuba | Lack of running water adds to other shortages

(Havana) Without running water for two weeks, Lorenzo Islem, 65, has no choice but to go and fill cans a kilometer from his home. In Cuba, water distribution difficulties are straining the patience of residents, already affected by shortages of all kinds.

“If I don’t do this, what am I doing?” I am dying at home of thirst and hunger,” the retiree told AFP upon arriving, panting and sweating, in his small wooden house in the Punta Brava district, 25 kilometers from the center of Havana.

The sixty-year-old had to walk nearly a kilometer in stifling heat, pushing a wheelbarrow loaded with three cans of water that he went to pick up from a friend’s house. He has lived in the neighborhood for ten years and has “never experienced anything like this”.

“The water problem is critical, we have not had water for 15 or 20 days,” he explains, emptying the contents of the cans into a tank in his kitchen. “I will make another trip later, because this water is for drinking and washing,” he adds, visibly exhausted by the effort.

Wheelbarrows, bicycles, carts, car trunks, horse-drawn carts: in Punta Brava, everyone does what they can to transport water to their homes.

On the island of less than ten million inhabitants, around 10% of the population is deprived of running water, recently recognized the president of the National Institute of Water Resources (INRH), Antonio Rodriguez.

“We have people affected in all provinces,” he explained. In Havana, three municipalities are experiencing a difficult situation, including La Lisa, which includes the neighborhood where Lorenzo Islem lives with his wife.

According to the head of INRH, the absence of tap water is due to a lack of “pumping equipment”, “power cuts” which deactivate the pumps and “breaks” in the pipes. On the island, some 300,000 people are currently supplied by tanker trucks.

However, these distributions by trucks entail additional fuel costs for the State and fuel a vicious circle in a country whose electricity cuts, which lead to suspensions of running water, are precisely caused by the lack of fuel.

“It’s too much”

For four years, Cuba has been going through a deep economic crisis, resulting in shortages of food, medicine and fuel, as well as frequent power cuts.

In question, the strengthening of the American embargo under Donald Trump (2017-2021) combined with the structural weaknesses of the Cuban economy, centralized and not very productive.

In Alturas, another neighborhood of La Lisa, Saray Lopez, 49, a stay-at-home mother, has not had running water in her home for “more than a month” and is in despair. “With all the problems we have, this is the package!” It’s too much,” she gets annoyed.

In a horse cart, a friend brought her two tanks of about 200 liters of water each, but Saray Lopez calculates that, even if she “is as careful as possible”, she will have water at most “for two days” in his household which has seven adults and two children.

According to INRH, over the past two years, Cuba has imported more than 1,200 pumps, 866 of which run on solar energy, as part of a program aimed at renewing the energy matrix of the sector.

Work is also underway to replace damaged pipes. According to official figures, in 2018, half of the water pumped onto the island was lost due to leaks.

Faced with difficulties, Saray Lopez says that a resident recently tried to sell him part of a tanker’s cargo on the black market for 4,000 pesos ($33), even though this service is normally free and the salary average tops out at 5,000 pesos ($42).

When residents see a tanker truck in their neighborhood, they run out of their homes, buckets, jerry cans and even pots in hand. But sometimes days pass without a truck appearing.

“Here, they have never sent a tanker truck,” complains Luis Imbert, 59, who, without hiding his bitterness, deplores the lack of “response” from the State.