Havana/At 800 pesos the sack in Sancti Spíritus; to 1,000 in Cienfuegos; A 1,400 in Holguín: The price of coal –Black gold For Cubans in a year that He already broke the record of electrical deficit – rises to the rhythm of a country without options to cook or light. In that context, the dismantling of Las Carbonerasa town that lived to manufacture and sell this product, complicates the energy panorama in Las Tunas.
Despite the urgency caused by the debacle of the electrical system, the production of coal in the tunas goes through a bad time. The agroforestry municipal company only had two producers in workforce and recently resigned. Now he works, according to its director, with intermittent operators, who “come, make an oven and leave.”
No carbon gives the account: the state pays 15 pesos per kilogram of coal – until recently it was only four – and in its plans it has to buy the sack at only 500 pesos, when the price in the informal market triples that figure and, In addition, you have to contribute the empty sack.
The children of the place were “predestined” to be coal and drunk
Las Carboneras did not have more than 10 houses, a report of the official Newspaper 26but he was at the head of coal production in the province. The town was an extremely poor place, on the road to the municipality of Puerto Manatí. The children of the place were “predestined” to be coal and drunkenness, to withstand misery and the “mythical mosquitoes”, were everyday.
“The neighbors began to leave one.
The silhouette of the great furnaces of the town – each one gave for full 100 bags – managed by barefoot workers and without protection against fire, was unmistakable, according to the man. Even at dawn, an operator watched the piras. Tuneros went to the place to buy coal without intermediaries. Despite the hardness of the trade, “they defended a particular business” and that contributed to their effort.
Without attributing the debacle to the State, Rojas recalls how the people were losing everything. First the school closed, which forced the children to have to walk several kilometers, on a path full of Marabú to go to the nearest classroom. They returned at night. Then the winery, with what left the few safe supplies that the oldest guajiros had.
“There was no choice paste At work since the sun rises, there is no way to walk around looking for food, at least not every day. We stop receiving the chicken, the mincer … ”
Rojas continues to maintain some ovens in the carboneras, encouraged by the rise in the price of coal
After 30 years of living of his work in Las Carboneras, and besieged by the four -wheel and bandits in the area, Rojas also left. “I endured everything I could, but the animals robbed me; One night came three men and they even threatened us. My wife entered a state of nerves that every time the dog began to cry. ”
They now live in an improvised “Bajareque” in Puerto Manatí, but they say they are “calm.” Rojas continues to maintain some furnaces in the carboneras, encouraged by the rise in the price of coal. However, it is clear with the journal of the Communist Party in Las Tunas: “Money does not reach me! This is not paid with anything. Making coal is very hard. ”
“As expected, the coalmen ask for clothes, shoes, files … they are not any worker,” complains the director of the agroforestry of the Tunas. “In recent times we have given them files, machetes, mochas, in small amounts ”. But production does not take off.
Injugated in abandonment and surrounded by Marabú, local authorities have been clear about the carboneras: “There is no longer a way to recover the community.”
