Cuban Bank Withholds Dollar Earnings from Doctors a Year After Returning from Angola

A pair of Cuban doctors who completed an “internationalist mission” in Angola have reported that, almost a year after their return to Cuba, the Banco Popular de Ahorro (BPA) still owes them the dollar earnings they earned for their work in the African country. The regime often exports professionals, mostly in the healthcare sector, to various countries.

Dr. Eliannys Saborit Oliva, an anesthesiologist, and her husband, Alfredo Miguel Ramos, an orthopedic surgeon, reside in the city of Bayamo, in Granma, and work at the Carlos Manuel de Céspedes Hospital. They were part of the Cuban medical brigade in Angola for three years, returning in October 2023.

In a letter sent to the official newspaper Juventud Rebelde, and published in the “Acuse de Recibo” section of the September 14 edition, the doctors denounced the arbitrary actions of the BPA and other banking and governmental authorities concerning the payment of the majority of their earnings. They have been unable to withdraw their funds from their accounts for almost a year because of a supposed lack of foreign currency availability. They are also unable to access their money at branches in other provinces that might have the funds.

In a brief introduction to the case, Juventud Rebelde noted that upon the doctors' return to Cuba in October 2023, “after bringing foreign currency into the country through their specialized service, the payment due to them has been minimally fulfilled,” adding, “The obligation to pay them the total amount of foreign currency owed in a reasonable period has not been met specifically by the Banco Popular de Ahorro.”

According to the doctors' letter, which the newspaper reproduced verbatim, “this situation, they assert, is more critical in Granma province, and due to banking policy, they do not accept our request for foreign currency in another province with greater availability because we do not reside there.” They revealed that colleagues from other provinces who also completed the so-called “medical mission” have already received their payments.

Saborit and Ramos questioned why the bank has not implemented “strategies to send monetary reinforcements, after almost a year of waiting to withdraw the foreign currency we are owed for bringing money into the country.” They emphasized that they represented the nation with dignity in Angola, saving lives under adverse conditions involving tuberculosis, hepatitis, HIV, malaria, and Covid-19, sacrificing time with their daughter and the rest of their family.

After filing multiple complaints “at the central banking level,” the doctors reported that they still “do not have the demanded money, no delivery date, and no possibility to buy a house and live independently.” The couple has made three trips to Havana and submitted letters to the Council of Ministers, but the governmental body “transferred the matter to the Central Bank of Cuba, which gives the same response: there is no availability,” the letter states.

“The low availability is real,” the doctors concluded in their complaint, “but it is not understandable to us that in almost a year, our demand has not been resolved.”

The Cuban government retains between 75% and 90% of the high salaries paid for Cuban doctors by countries that contract the regime for healthcare services. Part of the professionals' wages is deposited in accounts in Cuban banks, which they are supposedly able to withdraw without issue upon their return to the country. However, the case of the Granma doctors casts doubt on this possibility.

The export of Cuban professionals to other countries brought in $4,882,234,500 for the regime in 2022, according to the Statistical Yearbook of Cuba for that year, published by the National Office of Statistics and Information (ONEI).

For years, the Cuban regime has faced international accusations of promoting a “system of modern slavery” due to the treatment of members of the medical brigades on “internationalist missions” in other countries.

The UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Slavery, Tomoya Obokata, reiterated in January his call for the Cuban state to respond to serious allegations of human rights abuses suffered by Cuban professionals on international missions.

In the past year, Cuban banks and financial entities have cited a lack of cash as an excuse to deny clients who need to make withdrawals or transfers.

Last week, a Cuban named Irán Morejón Quintana reported on social media that the Banco Metropolitano refused to refund a deposit of 3,130 euros that he made with the argument that they did not have the cash to perform the refund. The young man complained to the Central Bank of Cuba and the Council of State's office, but neither has taken action to return his savings.

In January 2021, as part of the misnamed “Tarea Ordenamiento,” the government converted the savings of entrepreneurs, farmers, private sector workers, and also doctors and professionals on foreign missions, from CUC to Cuban pesos. Those affected woke up on January 1 of that year to find their bank accounts automatically converted to CUP. Both the private sector and “collaborators” who receive incentives on magnetic cards were excluded from the possibility of exchanging their money over the next six months, the period allowed for other savers.