Cuban Doctors in Angola to Sue over Theft of Their Dollars
against the Cuban military’s Antex Corporation
The tone rose during a tense two-hour meeting in Luanda: “We don’t want virtual money; they are scamming us.”
By Natalia López Moya (14ymedio)
HAVANA TIMES – In an atmosphere heavy with tension, meetings with Cuban professionals on official mission began this Friday in Angola. The measure of transferring part of their savings in Cuba to a “Clasica” card, without the possibility of withdrawing US dollars in cash as stipulated in the contract they signed, has only fueled more discontent.
At the meeting in Luanda, presided over by Carlos —the provincial coordinator for the Cuba intermediary company Antex— the criticism quickly intensified. Not a single voice supported the measure, according to testimonies gathered by 14ymedio. “It was a catharsis,” summarized Marcia (a name changed for this report), who assured that the disappointment with the actions of Antex (Antillean Export Corporation S.A.), owned by the Cuban military conglomerate Gaesa, dominated the interventions.
Carlos himself admitted that the document had already leaked after 14ymedio published last Wednesday, the announcement of the meetings.
“Say what you will, everything has already been decided,” said Marcia, who sees the current meetings as a formality that will not alter Antex’s decision to withhold cash and only allow purchases in Cuba’s dollarized stores with the Clasica card. “They’re letting us vent, but we’ve been making claims for years and nothing changes.”
This time, however, the professionals seem to have gone a step further. On July 14, they sent a letter to Cuban president Miguel Díaz-Canel denouncing the “breach of the payment method established in their contracts” and demanding to receive in dollars the amount accumulated, over years of service in Angola, in their Cuban bank accounts. Now, with no response from the president, they are willing to go to court.
The frustration at Saturday’s meeting was widespread. “It’s a violation of our contract, a violation that’s existed since day one,” said a doctor who has been in Angola for four years. She lamented that after years of demands, Havana had only agreed to offer them a “Clasica” card for purchases in the newly opened dollar stores on the Island, instead of allowing them to withdraw the currency in cash
Starting next year, the doctors will have two magnetic cards: the current one in the devalued MLC currency and the new Clasica card, but they will still be unable to obtain dollars in cash, as stipulated in their contracts. For the doctor, this was unacceptable. In her town in Cuba, she said, the only MLC store barely sells alcoholic drinks and tomato sauce.
“I don’t want to buy food, I don’t want to buy appliances, I want to buy a home,” she insisted. “Are they going to force us to commit crimes, to resort to the black market just to have real dollars? These are lifetime plans, entire families’ futures that you are destroying.”
The doctor emphasized the personal cost of the mission abroad: “We’ve lost family members, missed the birth of children, endured illnesses. These are moments we’ll never get back.” With only the equivalent of $200, paid in kwanzas, to cover their needs in Angola, the specialists live with hardship and broken promises from Antex. The rest of the payment, about $1,200, is withheld in Cuba to discourage desertions. “For months they gave us only $100 a month and it took social media pressure for them to make up that shortfall earlier this year. They’re exploiters,” Marcia stressed.
Cuba’s Antex Corporation, sanctioned by the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (Ofac), operates in Angola with a wide range of businesses, from road construction and airfield repair to managing travel agencies. Between 2013 and 2017 alone it received more than $1 billion from that country, according to El Toque. Through Antex and other companies, Cuba has been paid for its participation—financed by the USSR—in Angola’s civil war (1975–1991), during which it deployed more than 300,000 soldiers. By 2015, the Portuguese press reported that 70% of Angola’s healthcare personnel were Cuban.
As the two-hour meeting wore on, rejection of Antex grew stronger. “This is still a violation of our contract. A violation that’s been enforced since day one. I’ve been here four years and it’s always been this way,” complained another doctor. “Cuba is a country that now has four currencies,” criticized the doctor from a small rural town.
“I am not at all satisfied. I’m disappointed with this company,” concluded the doctor, who was followed by another health worker questioning the coordinator’s argument that Antex couldn’t pay in cash due to the US embargo and obstacles in transferring money to Cuba. “Well then, why are you sending my money to Cuba? If in Cuba you can’t give me the money, why send it there? Why don’t you give it to me here?” the specialist asked. “You’re scamming me, you’re stealing from me, so I’m going to sue Antex.”
The man, who has spent four years on the mission, raised his voice: “I’ll find a lawyer, I’ll sue, I’ll do whatever I have to do because you’re breaking the contract with me, which requires payment in dollars. That Clasica card is garbage, because it’s not real money in my hand.”
A doctor from Havana, working in Angola since 2020, also joined in: “Giving us a Clasica card is the worst-case scenario. Who is thinking about us? That’s what I ask myself. Who thinks about us? Who makes these decisions and really considers the collaborator?” she demanded. “Violated, robbed, disappointed—that’s how I feel,” she said bitterly.
“I didn’t come to this country to buy tomato paste or toilet paper,” added another outraged specialist. The doctors listed the personal and family hardships the mission had meant for them—from illnesses like malaria to weeks of working in clinics “in the middle of nowhere without electricity, at risk of assault or even murder,” as one doctor pointed out. “I came here to improve my family’s economy.”
Within the group, several military doctors also voiced their disapproval. One identified himself with the rank of major and condemned what he considered a scam. The warning of a lawsuit was echoed by several doctors, who even invoked the right to peaceful protest guaranteed by Cuba’s Constitution. “This is our way of protesting,” the officer concluded.
The brigade coordinator remained silent for most of the meeting, limiting himself to listening to the flood of complaints over the course of two hours. What became clear is that the usual justifications about the country’s difficulties no longer persuade medical brigades that have traditionally kept strict silence about their dissatisfaction, the breach of agreements and the extreme conditions under which they often work.
“Antex is not a transparent company,” said another doctor from Santiago de Cuba. He believes that, overall, the contract they signed “is abusive, because the collaborator has more duties than rights.” “We don’t want virtual money, we only accept our dollars,” he repeated at one of the tensest moments of the meeting. “I demand that I be paid what my contract states. The rest is unacceptable. Antex is a company that does not represent us; it has forgotten us.”
First published in Spanish by 14ymedio and translated and posted in English by Havana Times.