Washington warns that the economic crisis in Cuba is the product of a model designed to benefit the regime’s elite, not the people.
Miami, United States. – The Western Hemisphere Affairs Office of the United States Department of State denounced on Wednesday that the Cuban economy is structurally manipulated in favor of the regime’s senior officials, which dissuades foreign investment and sharpens the internal crisis suffered by the island.
In A publication in the social network Xthe entity declared: “Cuba is not open to businesses – he is rigged to benefit the regime’s offices.”
The publication emphasizes that “Cuba forces foreign companies to associate with the regime, stays with at least 60% of the profits and keeps the rest hostage. And rarely pays their debts.” In conclusion, he adds: “Cuban corruption, not the outside world, is what frightens money.”
These statements accompanied the dissemination of an article of Shareamericaa communication platform from the State Department, entitled “The regimes of Cuba and Venezuela put officials above citizens,” published last Monday. The text maintains that the economic problems of both countries are not the product of external sanctions, but of an endemic corruption and a management model designed to sustain authoritarian power.
“These are not isolated failures, but symptoms of a major design. Economic crises in Cuba and Venezuela were not imported. They are of local manufacture,” says the report.
According to the text, Cuba, once known for his health system and sugar exports, “now imports sugar, suffers constant blackouts and shortage of medical care.” However, in 2024, the regime allocated more than 37% of its total investment to the tourism and hotel sector, one more than eleven times higher than the inverted in combined health and education, according to data from the Spanish agency EFE cited in the article.
Although existing hotels register occupations around 30%, the government continues to build new tourist complexes. The article asks: “Who benefits?”, And replies: “Cuban military conglomerates as GaesaFincimex and Cimex, and the regime officials that direct them. ”These entities, indicate, control the sectors of tourism, remittances and retail trade, and“ serve the regime’s elite, not the public ”.
Meanwhile, “Cubans face fuel shortage, food and electricity, while resources deviate towards beach tourist complexes and vanity projects linked to the regime.” These assets, add the document, could be privatized in favor of the managers themselves when the collapse system, as happened with some state properties in the former Soviet Union.
The Venezuelan model: more military spending, less milk
The text compares the Cuban situation with that of Venezuela, noting that the regime of Nicolás Maduro operates a similar model, sustained in part for Cuban security services that monitor the Venezuelan armed forces.
According to Bloomberg Newsin 2024 the Venezuelan government spent more than 2,000 million dollars in just a few months, coinciding with the presidential electoral period. Although that same month raised $ 1.7 billion in taxes, the minimum wage remained below two dollars per month, less than a kilo of cheese, the text requires.
The Telesur portal is also summoned to point out that, although the regime announced a national budget for 2024 of more than 20,500 million dollars, only 180 million – less of 1% – were allocated to the health sector. In contrast, almost 1,000 million were assigned to military intelligence, while only 18 million were allocated to the food of more than 5 million schoolchildren, which is equivalent to $ 3.49 per student per year.
In terms of infrastructure, the document recalls that a railway agreement of 7.5 billion signed with China in 2009 left only “abandoned construction sites”, although the debt continues to be paid with oil at a reduced price. “In Venezuela, the blackouts regularly add large areas of the country in the dark,” adds the text.
An example cited is the 2024 blackout reported by the Venezuelan media, which affected 16 states, followed by another that left 20 states without electricity for more than 12 hours. According to the report, “years of negligence, theft and corruption by the regime are responsible.”
Control and repression model
Far from administrative errors, the article argues that what was described in both countries is part of a deliberate strategy: “It is not about policy errors, but about economic systems characteristics built to preserve authoritarian power.” In Cuba, companies managed by the Army dominate the economy, and investments are not allocated according to social needs, but based on the benefits that officials can obtain.
In Venezuela, mass public spending holds fraudulent elections and propaganda campaigns, while hospitals, schools are abandoned and debts are generated that mortgages the future.
“The Cuban and Venezuelan people are ingenious and resilient, but no amount of creativity can overcome systems that prioritize propaganda, power and personal benefit of corrupt leaders above public welfare,” says the article.
