“We Holguin residents are such that if they prick us we don’t even bleed”
14ymedio, Miguel García, Holguín, 25 October 2024 — Although the people of Holguín only have memories of October’s Hurricane Oscar, the El Nickel store, located at the intersection of Frexes and Máximo Gómez streets, still has its windows covered with panels. The reason for protecting the windows is not due to the winds or rains that the meteor brought to the province, but rather the authorities’ fear that popular indignation over the long blackouts will lead to a barrage of stones against the trade in freely convertible currency (MLC).
This Thursday, the downtown store offered a few goods, diminished by the lack of supplies and the compulsive purchases of customers who managed to prepare with canned goods, cookies and batteries for Oscar’s passage. “It seems that the windows will stay like this for a few more days, because we know that people here are very upset,” said Yunior, a driver of an electric tricycle that provides merchandise transport services on the outskirts of El Nickel. The social anger is summed up for the driver in a more than graphic phrase: “We Holguiners are such that if they prick us we don’t even bleed.”
Hard currency stores have been a frequent target of stone throwing in Cuba. The high prices and social inequalities that these businesses have contributed to aggravating are the fundamental fuel for these actions. The Holguin store sells household appliances, parts and accessories for motorcycles and cars, as well as sports equipment and food. “There are bicycles in there that cost 699 MLC, they have been there since the beginning and they have not been able to sell a single one,” Yunior criticizes. “In the four years since they turned El Nickel into a hard currency store, they have not reduced the price of those bicycles by a single dollar, despite the problems with transportation in this city.”
Other currency exchanges also keep their windows protected, which worsens the lighting inside.
Other foreign exchange markets also keep their windows covered, which worsens the lighting inside. “The height of absurdity, you go in and you can hardly see the products on sale because the few light bulbs that are on — when there is electricity, barely give a little light” — lamented a customer in another store in the MLC in downtown Holguin. Residents of the city have already experienced other moments of covered windows, such as in the days following the popular protests of July 11, 2021. “You can measure the degree of people’s discontent and the government’s fear by going around these stores to see if the windows are covered,” she adds.
This week, judging by the wooden planks covering the façade of El Nickel, it can be concluded that the discontent of the people of Holguín is high and so is the fear of the authorities.
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