MIAMI — At Miami’s Little Havana, there was speculation about the Cuban government’s motives for reporting on Wednesday that a fatal shooting at sea was related to a Florida-registered boat.
Along Eighth Street, outside La Ventanita at Versailles, Gus Garcia was among the Cuban Americans in Miami-Dade County who felt mistrust about any information coming from Cuban officials.
“The government has no freedom of the press, has no public opinion allowed, so anything the Cuban government says is what we consider a regime’s mouth piece ... I think anything that comes from there could be questioned,” Garcia said.
Through the Cuban Embassy in the U.S., Cuban officials reported four died, and six were injured on Wednesday morning in Cuban waters off the Villa Clara province.
“We are trying to get more information from Cuba,“ said Ramón Saúl Sánchez, a Cuban exile in Miami’s Little Havana who has long opposed communism.
Sánchez, who stays in touch with allies in Cuba, described their nightmarish conditions.
“Trash is not being picked up. There’s no medication. There’s no transportation,” Sánchez said. “There’s nothing. Life in Cuba is turning into hell.”
Dariel Fernandez, Miami-Dade County’s tax collector, released a statement questioning the veracity of the “so-called official statement” from the Cuban government, which he described as “a propaganda narrative from a regime with zero credibility.”
We do not believe a single word coming from a government that lies, represses, tortures, and executes its own people. Their version of events is unverified, unconfirmed, and cannot be trusted," Fernandez wrote.
Miami-Dade Mayor Daniela Levine Cava agreed.
“My administration is closely monitoring what occurred off the coast of Cuba. We are calling for a full and immediate assessment and complete transparency so the facts are clear and those responsible are held accountable,” Levine Cava wrote in a statement released on X.
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