Cuban dictatorship repairs Hotel Saratoga, but not the surrounding homes destroyed by its explosion

From our Bureau of Socialist Priorities with some assistance from our Bureau of Disrespect for the Quick and the Dead

Castro, Inc. is letting everyone know its priorities. See slide show above. The Hotel Saratoga, which was reduced to an empty shell by an explosion ten months ago, is now well on its way to being fully repaired. Such efficiency is rare in Castrogonia. In fact, it is so rare that it’s very easy to pinpoint the only sector of the island’s economic and physical infrastructure in which it can be found: Apartheid tourism.

While Castro, Inc. speeds up the restoration of the Saratoga, no effort whatsoever is being made to repair or replace the damaged buildings of its neighbors who were left homeless by the blast last May. And in Pinar del Rio, the thousands of Cubans left homeless by Hurricane Ian are still waiting for Castro, Inc. to repair their flattened homes or to offer sorely-needed assistance.

In addition to condemning the priorities of Castro, Inc., some Cubans are saying that to rebuild this hotel where 47 died is a sign of disrespect for the dead and their families. As one neighbor puts it: “They should demolish it, instead of remodeling that hotel where so many lives were lost. This will be a blow to the families of the deceased every time they walk by and see all that glittering building.”

Abridged and loosely translated from CiberCuba

Cuban authorities are advancing in the reconstruction of the Saratoga hotel in Havana, which was destroyed by a powerful explosion on May 6 around 10:50 a.m.

Photos taken by CiberCuba show the current state of the building, located at Paseo del Prado 603, which is still surrounded by a long fence.

The fateful explosion that caused 47 deaths, including four children, caused enormous damage throughout the building, except perhaps for the top floor, according to images of the destruction.

On the other hand, the adjoining residential building, which also suffered serious damage and where several of its residents died, from what can be seen in the images, is not being repaired, it only continues to be propped up.

From the first days after the tragedy, government representatives predicted that the Saratoga, run by the Gaviota hotel group, in the hands of the regime’s military leadership, offered no danger of collapse.

In September, more than four months after the tragedy, a neighbor of the Prado 609 building, adjacent to the hotel, denounced that “there is only ruin and destruction” in the place.

“Everything has been lost, nothing remains of what we built with great effort. Today there is only ruin and destruction and great hopelessness and uncertainty, without knowing when we will return to that life that we had achieved with so much sacrifice,” he said. The neighbor referred to the pain that all the former inhabitants feel for having lost their homes.

Whole story HERE in Spanish