DEFIANT TO THE END
Reviled and revered, Fidel Castro was a divisive figure whose death provoked both dancing and despair
ACompiled by JANE VORSTER S THEY streamed onto the streets of Miami in Florida, USA, they could not contain their joy. It was the dead of night and some were still in their pyjamas as they cheered and danced. The reason for their delight: they’d just heard the news that Fidel Castro, the leader who’d forced them to flee their homeland, had died.
But 530 km away in Cuba it was a different story. As the 11-million-strong population entered a nine-day mourning period, loyal supporters waved flags and broke into a mass chant of “I am Fidel”.
To some he remains a self-obsessed tyrant who pushed the world to the brink of nuclear war. But others see him as the ultimate revolutionary hero and champion of the poor and downtrodden.
One thing’s for sure: in death Fidel Castro remains as divisive as he was during his eventful life. But love him or loathe him, there’s no denying the gigantic role he played in 20th-century history, shaking things up by the sheer force of his personality.
With his bushy beard, cigars and green fatigues he was viewed as the ultimate revolutionary as he thumbed his nose at the West, establishing a communist regime on his island nation that withstood the collapse of the Soviet Union and kept him in power for 49 years, making him the world’s longest-serving leader. This was despite an alleged 637 assassination plots by his opponents, using everything from a poison pen to exploding seashells.
“If surviving assassination attempts were an Olympic event, I would win the gold medal,” he once joked.
But in the end Fidel had the last laugh, outlasting many of his enemies and living to 90 when old age finally claimed him.
FIDEL Alejandro Castro Ruz was born on 13 August 1926 in Birán, eastern Cuba. He was the product of an affair between a wealthy sugar plantation owner, Ángel Castro, and
one of his servants, Lina Ruz González. They later married and had six more children.
From a young age Fidel displayed a rebellious streak. He reportedly once rode his bicycle head-on into a wall to show his friends the sheer force of his will.
In 1953, two years after graduating with a law degree from the University of Havana, Fidel led 165 men in an uprising to overthrow Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista.
Many of the rebels were executed after the attempted coup but Fidel and his younger brother Raúl, who’d also taken part, were put on trial
Representing himself, Fidel gave a twohour speech, which ended with the oftquoted words: “Condemn me; it does not matter. History will absolve me.”
He was sentenced to 15 years in jail but ended up serving only two before being released under a general amnesty.
Fidel went into exile in Mexico, where he teamed up with Argentinian communist rebel Che Guevara. In 1956 the two revolutionaries sailed back to Cuba in a