Cuban-Americans want more

Local Cuban-Americans were mostly ho-hum on Tuesday about Fidel Castro's resignation as president of Cuba, saying it's no harbinger of real change for the communist island nation.

But Waldo De Castroverde, a Cuban-born Las Vegas attorney who fled Cuba nearly five decades ago and returned briefly to fight Castro during the Bay of Pigs, went so far as to call the dictator's resignation a let-down.

"To me, it's a defeat if he resigns," De Castroverde said after being reached on his cell phone in Miami, where he was visiting a friend. "It means we weren't able to kick him out. I would have loved to see him hanging from a tree."

De Castroverde and others echoed Cubans nationwide who believe little will change because of Castro's departure. After all, they said, the ailing 81-year-old hasn't been fully in control since he ceded power to brother Raul Castro in 2006. And Raul Castro isn't much different from his brother.

"I felt like he (Fidel Castro) was gone already," said Liliam Lujan Hickey, a former member of the Nevada State Board of Education who also came to the United States from Cuba as a refugee. "Raul may be worse than Fidel."

"He's no different," De Castroverde said. "He's not a good guy."

Several said that only Fidel Castro's death, along with his brother's death or loss of power, might bring change to Cuba.

That or an unlikely revolution by the Cuban people, said Sergio Perez, owner of the Florida Cafe Cuban Restaurant.

"In Cuba, the people have no tools for revolution," said Perez, who emigrated from Cuba by way of Mexico 15 years ago "because I wanted a beautiful life."

Still, Perez said, as in Miami, everybody in the local Cuban community is at least talking about Castro's resignation, which is why Perez decided to give away free "Cuba Libre" cocktails at his bar for a couple of hours late Tuesday afternoon.

"It feels good to see something happen," Perez said. "Even though, with his brother coming, it's the same situation."

Perez said he hopes to see "a free Cuba where people choose their president" soon, but he isn't holding his breath.

Neither is Otto Merida, local Latin Chamber of Commerce president who came to the United States as a teenage Cuban refugee in 1961.

"The fact that Fidel is resigning doesn't mean anything for freedom for Cubans," he said. "I remember being in Miami in the '60s and sitting down with an old man who said it was a matter of a few days until Castro was gone and things changed.

"That was like 50 years ago. It's something I've been saying for 50 years."

Still, Merida said, "We're closer than ever, and things are changing."

"People want to see more freedom, want the ability to do what they please. Change will hopefully come in my lifetime."

De Castroverde, 67, has not seen his Cuban homeland since 1962.

"There is a phrase from a Cuban poet that goes: without a country, but without a master," he said. "As long as there is no freedom, I will not go there."

Merida said he has a recurring dream that he returns to Cuba and has no trouble remembering how to get from the airport to his former home in Havana.

"I want to eventually go visit Cuba," he said. "But right now the whole thing continues."

Contact reporter Lynnette Curtis at lcurtis@reviewjournal.com or (702) 383-0285.