- Tires, batteries and spare parts are lacking for the 28 garbage trucks donated by Japan
- Due to the shortage of personnel, prisoners have been ordered to perform these tasks
- The La Güinera market is closed for a month due to the poor sanitary conditions
14ymedio, Madrid, 7 October 2024 — After rebuffing the insistent reports from the independent press for more than a year about the disastrous situation of garbage collection in Cuba – more specifically in Havana – the State media have begun to pay attention. This Monday they published their third consecutive analysis of the issue, which has become alarming, according to them. All three landfills in Havana, without exception, “collapsed,” admits Roberto Cárdenas Santos, technical deputy director of the Provincial Company of Communal Hygiene, who also confirms that they exceeded “the authorized height levels.”
His boss, Alberto Ernesto Rodríguez García, maintains that the main problem affecting the capital is “the technical coefficient of the collection equipment, mostly stopped due to lack of tires, batteries and spare parts that have been deteriorating.” The official told Cubadebate that an expenditure of seven million pesos has been approved to acquire between 300 and 400 tires and 126 batteries. “With these, all the equipment that is working in the city could be repaired, and we would have a better sanitation situation,” he says. In addition, a container of parts has been imported for the Narciso López Roselló Equipment and Applications Company, where specialized equipment and other trucks are repaired and maintained.
Nothing allows us to ensure that this is the end of the problem. The managers of Comunales maintain that fuel is not an inconvenience in this case, since the company has a guaranteed allocation. Trucks have an average of 1 or 1.2 liters of gasoline reserved for each cubic meter collected, which is no small thing taking into account the widespread shortage for most industries and homes.
Trucks have reserved an average of 1 or 1.2 liters of gasoline for each cubic meter collected
However, the 28 trucks that were donated from Japan in 2019 suffer pressing needs. “There is a significant deficit of parts to support this equipment. Although maintenance was done on time, several trucks began to fail, and those that were left had to replace the others and were overexploited,” adds Rodríguez García.
In addition, waste collection suffers from one of the great evils that weighs on the already impoverished national economy: the shortage of personnel. This Monday’s report in Cubadebate speaks of a “labor fluctuation,” as they have decided to designate this new euphemism for the lack of workers caused by the massive emigration of the last two years, especially among people of working age. Thus, “the court has given them the ability to hire prison inmates, the main workforce today that takes care of garbage collection activity,” reveals the newspaper.
There are two other difficult jobs that the prisoners must assume: the collection of charcoal made from the marabou plant and the cutting of sugar cane. The Cuban regime resorts to these prison workers to cover vacant positions, a fact that has been denounced by organizations such as Prisoner Defenders. Tomoya Obokata, special rapporteur on the UN’s Contemporary Forms of Slavery, deplored this method.
Although the Government approved new labor laws at the end of 2023 to regulate the working conditions of prisoners and guarantee them new rights, sentencing prisoners to “correctional” work – included in the Criminal Code – is prohibited in most Western countries.
Workers are not the only deficiency facing the Government. There is one that is even more worrisome: a lack of the faithful. “We are being affected by the deficit of professional staff for the management of communal services. Cerro, Centro Habana and Plaza are without directors. Arroyo Naranjo and Boyeros also have problems. With a lack of central personnel, the control structure crumbles. The rules are there for a reason, because you don’t collect just to collect; there is a mechanism for providing quality service,” says Rodríguez García.
“With a lack of central personnel, the control structure crumbles. The rules are there for a reason, because you don’t collect just to collect; there is a mechanism for providing quality service”
This absence, he insisted, affects the organization and the awareness of citizens, whom he also urged to do their part to maintain hygiene.
Among the most affected municipalities, Cubadebate deals specifically with Diez de Octubre, where this Friday Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel went in person to supervise the mountains of garbage. Arroyo Naranjo is also mentioned, among others, where the Municipal Administration Council has been forced to make an unprecedented decision: to close the La Güinera market for one month due to the sanitation conditions, although they also mention the importance of “individual activity.”
“During this period, actions will be carried out by the different entities involved in the repair of dumpsters, pipe leaks and roads in the area,” the government of Havana announced on social networks. Merchants have regretted the suddenness of the situation, which forces them to store merchandise that can be damaged during this time, although most users have applauded a decision that improves the precarious health situation in the area and ask that it be generalized throughout the capital.
This Monday’s report clarifies the seriousness of the situation when Cubadebate does not mince words to describe it: Stench, mountains of solid waste, rodents, diseases and garbage that “springs from the city like one more limb.” “It is an issue that concerns everyone,” it continues, “and if everyone, authorities and citizens, don’t add a grain of sand, Havana cannot be that marvelous city that it aspires to be.”
Translated by Regina Anavy
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