The local press is debating whether the President of Cuba, Fidel Castro was in the DR in 1958. Hoy newspaper has published interviews with residents of the southwestern city of Baní that say Castro was allowed by then Dictator Rafael Trujillo to train guerrillas in the military base of Bahía de las Calderas. Trujillo latter supported Cuban dictator Batista. Francisca Antonia Pimentel says that while Fidel Castro was born and raised in Cuba, neither his father nor his mother were Cubans. She says Castro was the son of a Spaniard and a Dominican, but that his parents were not married, thus he carried the last name of his mother, Castro.
