What Isn’t Working?

What Isn't Working? / Fernando Damaso
Posted on October 12, 2014

Let's take a look at four different situations.

In the case of the national railway, the authorities in charge claim
that its problems are due to outdated equipment and the lack of proper
maintenance resulting from a lack of spare parts. The system has not
been updated in more than fifty years. As a result the No. 1 train from
Havana to Santiago de Cuba, which used to run daily, now only makes the
trip every three days. For the last eight years the Havana to Holguin
train has not run at all.

Those that are running do so at reduced speed and with a fewer number of
train cars. When the air conditioning in one of the French-made train
cars breaks down, it remains permanently of service and passengers must
resort to opening tiny windows instead. The system also suffers from
organizational problems and widespread indiscipline.

For years the sizes of school uniforms sold at the beginning of the
school year have not corresponded to students' actual sizes, which have
become much smaller to poor nutrition. Though the problem persists year
after year, the ministries of education and industry have still not come
up with a solution.

Camping, the only vacation option available to the average Cuban, does
not live up to expectations or its costs. Camping facilities are
run-down, the food is of poor quality and badly prepared, amenities are
minimal and the available services leave much to be desired.

Drinking water is in short supply in the suburb of Villa Panamericana
near the town of Cojimar. Planners did not take into account the fact
that project's cisterns relied on gravity and that the supply came
directly from the tank itself, so of course it cannot reach the third,
fourth or fifth floors of the town's existing buildings.

One might think that this string of calamities is directly related to
those provide these services. That assumes that these people do not know
how to do the work or simply do it badly. However, in spite of a
constant turnover of directors, administrators and personnel, things are
no better. One would then have to assume that it is the system itself
that is not working.

Neither classic nor actual socialism has worked in any of the countries
in which it has been tried. The evidence is plain to see. In Cuba it has
never worked, not in the past and not in the present. I think this will
also be the case with "prosperous and efficient socialism." At least
that is how I see things so far.

8 October 2014

Source: What Isn't Working? / Fernando Damaso | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/what-isnt-working-fernando-damaso/