Economist Pedro Monreal calls Feitó’s words “insolently reactionary” for fighting the poor instead of fighting poverty.
14ymedio, Havana, 14 July 2025 — The Minister of Labor and Social Security, Marta Elena Feitó, sparked a wave of indignation after her address to the Cuban Parliament on Monday. In an attempt to reduce the impact of the alarming number of homeless people, the official stated that in Cuba “there are no beggars,” but rather citizens “disguised as beggars.”
Her declarations, delivered during the joint meeting of the Permanent Commissions for the Care of Local Organs of People’s Power and for Children, Youth, and Women’s Equality, were quickly criticized on social media as “a desperate attempt to eliminate a problem by denying its existence” and also as “a way of dehumanizing the most vulnerable.”
She called them “drunkards, malingerers, and illegals.”
From the parliamentary platform, Feitó maintained that those who roam the streets in precarious conditions do not suffer from extreme poverty, but rather fake that reality for opportunistic purposes. She called them “drunkards, deceivers, and illegals” and asserted that the role of the State is not to recognize structural poverty, but rather to “prevent social opportunism” and “combat it.” According to the minister, the social deterioration that the country is experiencing is not explained by failures of the economic system, but by “individual selfishness” and a “lack of values.”
Feitó’s words provoked a strong reaction from economist Pedro Monreal, who wrote on his X account: “The ’minister’ of miserable wages and pensions has made the most insolently reactionary speech about continuity.” Monreal, one of the most critical and authoritative voices in Cuban economic thought, stressed that “the fight is against poverty, not against the poor” and attacked the lack of proposals to raise citizens’ real incomes.
“We do nothing with rolling down the window and handing out money. On the contrary, we are distorting things. We must fight them”
During her presentation, the minister offered no figures, plans, or solutions to address the precariousness affecting millions of Cubans. Nor did she address the deteriorating pensions or the helplessness of thousands of retirees, much less the runaway inflation that has turned state salaries into a dead letter. Her intervention focused on rejecting the images of poverty circulating in the media and online, reducing the phenomenon to “something out of the movies” or “a perception imposed from abroad.”
The minister clarified that those who clean windshields at traffic lights are not homeless, but rather “people who have found an easy way of life.” She added: “We’re not doing anything by rolling down the window and handing out money. On the contrary, we are distorting things. We must combat them. We cannot allow this conduct.”
In another of her most controversial passages, Feitó even denied that hunger exists on the island. “Divers? No, the divers are in the water. Those people in the garbage dumps are looking for cans,” she said. She added: “They’re not looking for food. That’s not true either. These are the patterns they’re trying to impose on us. They’re self-employed illegals who are violating the treasury.”
Social media and independent media quickly picked up on the impact of her words. Many Cubans reacted with disbelief and anger at what they considered a complete lack of empathy, as well as a total disconnect from the country’s reality. While Feitó denied the existence of hunger and begging, on the streets of any Cuban city it is common to see elderly people rummaging through garbage, people sleeping in doorways, and mothers begging for milk or medicine.
“There must also be people disguised as ministers,” Monreal concluded.
Unlike other countries in the region, where discussion of poverty and social inequality takes center stage in parliamentary debates, in Cuba the official discourse seems to focus more on denying the problem than addressing it. The minister, far from proposing concrete measures or admitting mistakes, chose to discredit the victims, accusing them of violating tax laws or feigning poverty. “There must also be people disguised as ministers,” Monreal concluded in his most scathing comment.
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