A record number of Cubans are fleeing the island, which is suffering its worst socioeconomic crisis since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The number of Cubans seeking to enter the United States, mainly through the Mexican border, skyrocketed from 39,000 in 2021 to more than 224,000 in 2022. Many sold their homes at rock-bottom prices to afford one-way flights to Nicaragua and travel through Mexico bound for the United States.
The 11 million Cubans still on the island find themselves in an increasingly desperate situation. Internal emigration from the poorest provinces has caused an overcrowding in the capital, Havana. Those for whom the government cannot provide a home live in abandoned shelters, some at grave risk of collapse.
Serious shortages of food and medicine are a daily reality in a country plagued by a US trade embargo since 1962 and strict government control of the economy since 1959. Regular power cuts remind Cubans of the first years of the 1990s, when Soviet subsidies ran out as the USSR collapsed, leaving the island in a bind.
In order to survive that “special period”, Cuba began to depend on foreign exchange earnings from international tourism and from nationals working abroad. Both incomes were reduced considerably. The measures caused by the Covid-19 forced the closure of the island to foreign tourists and reduced the number of visitors by 75 percent during 2020.
The untimely currency reforms, which unified Cuba’s two currencies at the beginning of 2021, created a shock inflationary. Food shortages sparked a black market boom.
short truce
In 2016, following more than half a century of hostilities, relations between the United States and Cuba were in the doldrums. Barack Obama became the first active US president to visit the island since Calvin Coolidge in 1928. And the British The Rolling Stones rocked Havana with a free concert.
Full cruise ships unloaded their passengers in the port of Havana, to be taken in classic convertible cars to tour the capital. Foreigners flocked to Havana to soak up the heady atmosphere, with Rihanna, Beyoncé and Jay-Z among the vanguard of high-end Western visitors.
Private enterprise temporarily flourished while a spirit of optimism was everywhere. But Cuba’s economy and relationship with the United States faltered once more following the election of Donald Trump in November 2016, just as Fidel Castro, the former leader of the Cuban revolution, died. President Trump reinstated travel and business restrictions imposed decades earlier.
Meanwhile, US diplomats and intelligence officers stationed on the island reported hearing loss, headaches and vertigo in a mysterious outbreak of “Havana syndrome” in late 2016. Washington blamed Cuba and recalled most of the embassy staff, just two years following both governments reopened embassies in their respective capitals for the first time since 1961.
One of Trump’s last acts before leaving office in January 2021 was to return Cuba to the list of state sponsors of terrorism, obstructing its access to international finance. Trump had already restricted remittances that Cuban-Americans might send to the island.
President Joe Biden has changed policy once more as pressure mounts over the increase in illegal migration to the United States. Biden reopened the US Embassy in Havana for visa applications in January 2023, offering some Cubans an official path to emigrate.
Endurance
The increase in internet access since 2018 and the widespread use of social networks play significant roles in a new state of mind among Cubans. The Economist Intelligence Unit describes its double impact: demand for political and economic liberalization and accountability increased, while US sanctions and support from dissidents emboldened hardliners resisting reform.
Despite government restrictions and poor infrastructure, 68 percent of Cubans have internet access. WhatsApp, Instagram and other social networks are widely used by Cubans, especially young people.
Internet access was key in the 2021 Cuban protests, when local discontent fueled by Covid-19 restrictions and widespread shortages led to street protests that police quickly suppressed. Many high-level Cuban artists and bloggers accused by the government of being financed by the United States were detained.
Migration
Ana María, a 52-year-old Cuban mother of two, described the increase in crime and corruption. People, she pointed out, would rather sell products on the black market than work for wages that do not cover basic needs.
The famous capacity for survival of Cubans in the face of difficulties is reaching its limit. Hope is fading fast.
After six decades of trade blockade, and a rigid socialist model, the plummeting standard of living has led two percent of the Cuban population to leave the island in just one year.
Many more are desperate to follow in their footsteps.