“We’re Backlogged” / Kirenia Dominguez Alvarez, Cuban Law Association

Kirenia Domínguez Álvarez

This is the response given by the Municipal Department of Housing (UMIV) to citizens who show up to get the documents that they have requested days earlier in order to complete some transaction relating to their homes.

Many documents and titles have been lost, without any compensation for the resulting damages.

Claribel told me, very sadly, that she has requested for the second time her mother’s last will, and the opinion of the architect, and that these can expire if the Municipal Department of Housing does not expedite the processing necessary to convey to her the property she inherited from her mother some years ago.

After the fifty days that the law provides for these cases had elapsed, Claribel returned to the agency. Their response was a terse rejection without any explanation.

We conclude with the response that these officials gave her, after she had complained to the government about the long delay: “We do not understand what the architect wrote in his opinion.” So should we call it a backlog, or is it really a deficiency, a lack of knowledge, and an outrage to the public?

1 August 2013