Cuba’s communist regime suspended all education and work activities for Friday and Saturday in a last ditch desperate effort to “save power” in the face of Cuba’s barely functional power grid.
The measure, according to the Castro regime, seeks to reduce power consumption in Cuba as the already long power blackouts that have plagued the country in recent years worsened over the past weeks.
The disastrous communist policies of the Castro regime, which has ruled the island-nation for more than six decades, left Cuba with a power grid that can no longer properly generate enough electricity for the whole country on a consistent basis. As a result, Cubans are forced to live through daily, near-endless blackouts that can last an average of 18 hours.
The barely functional power grid completely collapsed several times towards the end of 2024. While the Castro regime managed to bring it back online some days later, the blackouts have become more frequent and longer since it first collapsed in October.
Cuba experienced several over-20-hour-long blackouts in recent weeks. At some points throughout the backouts, as much as 57 percent of the nation lacked electricity at the same time. Wednesday reportedly marked the highest number of individually documented blackouts since 2023. According to Granma, the official newspaper of the Communist Party of Cuba, the nation has 15 thermoelectric plants, of which only six are in operation. Four are undergoing maintenance and the rest are “out of service in the process of troubleshooting.”
The blackouts once again worsened this week as the nation’s power grid reached a “minimal availability” in electricity generation. The capital city of Havana, described as the “least affected” area by the blackouts by its inhabitants, reportedly experienced a power blackout every three hours throughout Thursday. In recent days, the Cuban provinces of Villa Clara, Cienfuegos, Sancti Spíritus, Matanzas, and Granma experienced up to 30-hour-long blackouts.
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In a last ditch effort, the Castro regime’s Labor and Social Security Minister Marta Elena Feito Cabrera announced on Thursday evening the nationwide suspension of all “non-essential” education and work activities between Friday, February 14, and Saturday, February 15.
The minister explained that the decision was taken into account the country’s energy situation and in order to “contribute to the necessary savings in electricity consumption to mitigate the effects on the population.”
📢ATENCION ‼️#MtssCuba pic.twitter.com/SSnZqcmr0F
— Marta Elena Feito Cabrera (@MartaEFeito) February 14, 2025
Despite the Castro regime’s announcement, it is reportedly expected that up to 46 percent of Cuba will simultaneously suffer blackouts during the late evening/night peak power consumption hours of Friday. The regime admitted on Friday morning that it will only be able to generate 1,735 megawatts of power and thus cannot sustain power to cover Friday night’s projected maximum peak hour demand of 3,100 megawatts.
It remains unclear at press time if the worsening blackouts and the decreed suspension of education and work activities will have any effect on the 33rd Havana International Book Fair, a leftist event that the Castro regime’s figurehead President Miguel Díaz-Canel kicked off on Thursday while much of Cuba was left without power. Footage of the event published by the state media website Cubadebate on Thursday appears to indicate that the event is not affected by the power blackouts.
According to the Castro regime, the event will attract “400 foreign guests from more than 40 countries.” The government of South Africa is the event’s “guest of honor” country as 2025 marks the 30th anniversary of the formal establishment of bilateral relations between late South African President Nelson Mandela and late murderous dictator Fidel Castro. The event will run through February 23 in Havana and will then move across the nation’s provinces, wrapping up in the city of Santiago de Cuba on March 23.
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here
