Yunia Figueredo was fed up with the hours without electricity, with enduring the stifling nights of Jaimanitas — a town west of Havana — without a fan to ward off the mosquitoes and their merciless bites. In the mornings, there were endless lines just to get something to eat; at night, sleep was impossible. She would watch her husband and her daughters — both minors — wake up defeated by a perpetual exhaustion, with little or nothing to eat for breakfast.

Her only solace was the sea breeze, just a few meters from her home — the very place from which she hauled buckets of water to keep the plumbing running in the small house where she lives. Without electrical power, the State — which controls all public utility companies — is unable to pump water regularly to a city of some two million inhabitants.

These blackouts have a cause: socialist inefficiency in repairing or modernizing aging thermoelectric power plants — some dating back to the Republican and Soviet eras — and corruption. According to a senior official in Washington, in 2025, the regime resold a large portion of its subsidized Venezuelan oil — some 70,000 barrels per day of crude and refined products — valued at $1.3 billion.

Yunia had already reported on the situation in Jaimanitas for the media outlets where she works as an independent journalist. But nothing had changed. “Everything here in Jaimanitas is a disaster,” she told me for this article. “There is absolutely nothing.”

That is why, on March 10 at 2:00 a.m., she stepped out onto the neighborhood’s poorly paved street and broken sidewalk, carrying empty pots and pans, to protest against the blackouts. For an hour, she recounted, she banged those empty vessels in the street, until nearly half a dozen neighbors joined her.

The protest that Yunia initiated is part of a wave of demonstrations against socialism — undoubtedly the largest wave of its kind since July 11 and 12, 2021 (events collectively known as 11J). Amidst these events — which began on March 6 — groups of residents take to the streets every night to protest. The most recurring forms of protest these days include “cacerolazos” (banging pots and pans), burning trash, painting anti-regime graffiti in public spaces, and blocking streets in various regions of the island. And, in a sort of contagion effect, more neighborhoods are beginning to lose their fear.

Yunia, who attends the Evangelical League of Cuba along with her family, was detained on the afternoon of the day the “cacerolazos” began, according to the Cuban Institute for Freedom of Expression. During her detention, police officers threw Yunia’s phone to the ground — all of this right in front of her daughters. “My girls shouted things at the police officers as they took me away,” Yunia recalled for this article. After the patrol car sped off, she spent several hours at an undisclosed location.

She is not the only Christian who has taken to the streets during this wave of protests.

Defying the infamous adage that Christians do not get involved in politics, diverse voices of believers have joined those of civil society over the last six decades to demand freedom. In fact — particularly during the 2018-2022 period, through the Evangelical Civic Movement — the Cuban Church took the initiative in saying “No” to the policies of the totalitarian state.

As an extension of that momentum, from 2025 to the present day, another phenomenon has emerged: the most far-reaching independent political voices within Cuba today belong to young evangelicals. Among them are Anna Bensi, Iván Daniel Calás, and Ernesto Ricardo Medina; The latter is currently imprisoned for his criticisms of the system voiced through the El4tico project, which he co-founded.

On March 11 — as part of the wave of protests constituting this Cuban Spring of Fire — an evangelical pastor from the Buenavista neighborhood in Havana also stepped out of his home. For security reasons, I cannot reveal his name; however, thanks to him, we now know that on that night, his neighborhood witnessed the burning of trash and “cacerolazos” events that have gone unreported by other media outlets.

Two days later, 450 kilometers east of the capital, another protest took place: one that would mark a turning point in the history of the anti-Castro movement.

On the night of March 13 and into the early hours of the 14th, hundreds of residents of the town of Morón — located in the center of the country — took to the streets chanting: “Down with the dictatorship!”, “We are not afraid!”, “Turn on the power!”, and “Freedom!” They marched until they surrounded the local station of the National Revolutionary Police, while uniformed officers scrambled to cordon off the building.

Subsequently, the protest spread to the municipal headquarters of the Communist Party of Cuba, where some of the demonstrators hurled stones at the building and lit a bonfire in the street using documents and furniture taken from the premises.

In the days following the demonstration, the regime unleashed a witch hunt against alleged protesters. The youngest son of evangelical pastor Elier Muir Ávila — 16-year-old Jonathan Muir Burgos — remains in detention after being summoned, along with his father, to a police station and subsequently transferred to an undisclosed location, amidst growing tension in Morón.

Both men were taken into custody by military personnel on charges of participating in the intense protests. For hours, the family had no information regarding their whereabouts. Concern deepened among family members and activists consulted for this article due to the teenager’s delicate health condition.

Hours later, human rights organizations confirmed that the pastor had been released, though his son had not. He remained in custody at the Technical Investigations Department in the city of Ciego de Ávila. There — according to reports I was able to access — he was reportedly being processed and threatened with facing charges “with the full weight of the law.”

Protests continue every night in Cuba. The repression promises to do the same. Castroism does not appear to want the country’s reality to change; will the unwavering will of the people in the streets succeed in changing it?