Las Tunas City Boulevard, 7:53 am, any day in July 2020. Ada Irma is 68 years old and she assures that she has specialized in queuing, not by her own decision, but because she does not have the resources to acquire the products of first necessity at extra cost. On the agreed date she arrives at about 4:00 in the morning in the historic center. She lives near the airport and she has to walk a lot, "in fact, that night she doesn't sleep a wink."
Las Tunas, Cuba.- She goes to the Blue House or La Gumer stores, there is always someone who alerts her about how the "thing" is going and most of the times they tell her that the line has been there for 10 hours; however, she does not believe in "tall tales" and stays there. Ada Irma confesses that she can't do it every day, because her bones are no longer able to cope with these hardships and her right knee hurts "like a dog's stick."
But she has no other choice, she lives with her daughter and granddaughter, three women alone and she is the most suitable to buy oil, chicken and detergent; the rest is pure luxury to which she does not aspire.
A few metres away, Yusnabi takes her one-and-a-half-year-old daughter down for a break. He gives her water and the baby keeps repeating: "Buy me a blue candy, buy me one...". She has been there for more than an hour and has already a place on the queue as a mother with a small child, but even so, she has a lot of people in front of her, because between handicapped and pregnant and "a little bit of everything" the experience tells her that more or less at noon she will return home.
"I had to bring the girl to be able to buy, I ran out of oil a while ago and I can't pay 100.00 pesos in Revolico. I also need soap, detergent, imagine that, I wash daily; and I'm not going to give 50.00 pesos to anyone to buy a better place in the line. It's my turn to punish the girl, there's no other option.
Ada Irma's jokes are not heard or felt by Yusnabi's little girl when the doors open.
"This looks like a western. And it's always the same faces, they make a fuss about people not protesting and they score for 10 more. As soon as they come out, they approach you and offer you the products. I bought the chicken in front of the store for 15.00 CUC, I give them the pleasure, but I take something for the house", says Elba, neighbour of the Aguilera neighborhood.
"Hey, this is outrageous, I've been here since before 6:00 in the morning and the first ones put their partners in front of them, who are neither one nor two, and they arrive fresh and buy first. Those are the same people who then promote the shampoo and conditioner on social networks at $15.00 a knob," says Yenney, a teacher.
APPRECIATING THE SHOWDOWN
Since last week, a kind of crusade against crime has been underway in the country, which is flourishing in the shadow of the queues. Arcadis Estrada Rodríguez, head of the State Inspection Department (DIS) in the municipality of Las Tunas, says that in the current context 25 concrete measures have been put in place to act in the territory.
"We know what is happening and we have acted accordingly," said the manager. Following the indications of the highest authorities, we have defined 37 scenarios in Las Tunas city that are vulnerable to illegalities and, therefore, an equal number of detachments have been created to operate in these areas and dismantle any criminal activity.
"The groups are made up of members of the CDR, FMC, FEU, Commerce, MININT, the Association of Combatants and DIS inspectors. Each one works in a specific environment, whether it be stores of the Cimex and Caribe chains, pharmacies, agricultural markets and other commercial units. We are using the digital application Porter@ for access control, by means of the number of Identity Card, operated by colleagues of Commerce, and in this way we limit a little the affluence of the same people to the establishments.
"So far we have acted with rigour. In the first 48 hours we warned 76 citizens prophylactically and imposed 42 fines of between 100.00 and two thousand pesos.
"We have been taking action with individuals who have been detected in the resale of basic necessities, and who market or resell the goods through social networks. Fines of two thousand pesos have been imposed on these individuals, goods have been confiscated and in certain cases we have placed them at the disposal of the competent criminal authority.
"Our intention is to strengthen the work in the communities to win this confrontation from the neighborhoods and to be able to identify the warehouses. We are expanding the investigative processes, for which we ask the population to denounce what has been done wrong through our telephone number 371238."
Lisbet Pavón Marchant, chief prosecutor of criminal proceedings in the province, recently told local radio that the law provides for penalties of three months to one year's imprisonment or fines of 100 to 300 quotas, or both, for speculation and hoarding. In the case of reception, he specified that three months to one year's imprisonment is provided for, and when this is done for the purpose of resale or trafficking, or in considerable amounts, the penalty ranges from two to five years.
In the case of illegal economic activities, they may be sentenced to between three months and two years' imprisonment, depending on the labour used and the means or methods of committing the offence. Pavón Marchant said that in this particular context the confrontation with these criminal typologies is very strong and the sanctions will be very severe.
7:53 am, Las Tunas City Boulevard, any day of August 2020
We know that these are the first steps of an old problem, and it is too naive to assume that, in just one week, stories like those of Ana Irma, Yusnabi or so many others we met on our journey, are tales of the past. The reality is still more or less the same, although, in some places, the features of the incipient control are beginning to show.
The fact that the work is now conceived in a multi-sectoral manner is an encouragement. Above all, because it is the most certain way of involving the people in a battle against the same people who are queuing up, resellers, hoarders and currency dealers, which the country has to fight head on, because we cannot wait any longer.
President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez has insisted on the idea that this is not the time to hunt down witches and that we must be fair to the uniqueness of each case. Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz assured that we will win this game. We know, the fight is hard, because those who profit and commit crimes in the midst of the shortcomings of many have been taken over.
Let's put our hand on our chest and reflect... at this moment, marked by the financial impact of the Covid-19, in Cuba and the world, the productive inadequacies of our economy, the people who do what they should not do and so on, it is going to be very difficult for us to have shelves full of merchandise in the immediate future. All the more reason to make sure that all the resources reach the right hands, without intermediaries or surcharges.
