The endless lines at gas stations return to Cuba

Photos by Yamil Lage and video by Maylin Alonso ///La Habana, 22 Mar 2022 (AFP) - Some arrived at dawn, others sigh at the long lines of cars in front of gas stations: in Cuba, refueling with gasoline for a few days is a nightmare, largely due to the low production of Venezuela, their supplier. scorching in front of the Malecón, the famous Havana waterfront, dozens of cars disciplinely make the queue, which goes around the block twice around the gas station.Lada and Moskvitch brands predominate, as well as motorcycles with sidecars, also inherited from the Soviet era, whose drivers push them to save the little fuel they have left.A second row, near the bombs, gathers those who arrived with their drums. Some police and military officers are watching the place. Running with his canister full of fuel, a Cuban rushes to fill the tank of his car parked farther away. “They only give 20 liters,” he says before returning to the line in the hope of getting more. He arrived at seven in the morning and he feels lucky: on Monday, he waited in vain from 11 a.m. until midnight.These scenes make many go back to September 2019, when US sanctions blocked the arrival of Venezuelan tankers who carry oil to Cuba. Many motorists then had to spend several days and even early hours in front of the gas stations. - “Five or six hours” of waiting - A crisis like this “is not the first time it has happened,” says Enrique García, 44, a driver of a state-owned company.” It has been other times that gasoline is lost and you have to wait in line, and you lose almost the whole day in that,” adds the resigned man, who is lying on the hood of his white Lada. This time, “I think it started since Friday, Saturday”, says Santiago Segueiro, 51, behind the wheel of his taxi. “On Saturday I had to queue for three hours to pour (fuel), and now we are going to see” .Segueiro is not very optimistic: “I arrived half an hour ago or so and from what I am seeing, if the fuel doesn't run out, it will be about 5 or 6 hours. The bad thing is that it ends, and the queue is for pleasure”, he adds. In anticipation, many arrived at the gas station with water and sandwiches. Ojilma Mena, 48 years old, came walking bottle in hand. “I have the car parked there, but it does not have technical conditions to be constantly starting” during the wait. The woman expects to finish in about an hour and considers that the lack of fuel is linked to the conflict in Ukraine. “With a global situation like this, it's not surprising,” he says. - A less generous Venezuela - To date, the Cuban authorities have not given any explanations. On Monday, the province of Matanzas, a neighbor of Havana, announced fuel rationing, but the local government representative said it was a “temporary problem.” It is not the result of a fuel deficit in the country, but rather responds to logistical assurance for its distribution,” he said.For Jorge Piñón, a Cuban expert in energy policy at the University of Texas, “a series of events culminate in the current situation,” he said.For Jorge Piñón, Cuban energy policy expert at the University of Texas, “a series of events culminate in the current situation,” including the fall in national oil production (-20% since 2010). But what is the main factor? Venezuela, a supplier of crude oil to Cuba, which the island pays by sending doctors, has been less generous for some years."Starting in 2016, Venezuela's crude oil and fuel supply plummeted from approximately 100,000 barrels a day to an average last year (2021) of 56,000 barrels a day,” says Piñón. Currently, “Venezuela's refineries are operating at minimum levels (due to lack of maintenance), and they don't have gasoline or diesel to send to Cuba,” he adds. He emphasizes that Caracas “has recently been faced with the need to import diesel and gasoline from Iran by exchange of crude oil”. To top it all off, Cuba cannot afford the high prices of the international market. Finally, recent power plant failures in Cuba have increased the use of generators, which are large consumers of diesel, precisely the fuel used by the American classics that have made the country famous, and which now also will have to wait for better times.ka/lp/yow —