Comparing Portuguese indentureship to Indian indentureship

May 23, 2009 Letters

Dear Editor,
I refer to Kowlasar Misir’s letter “Indentureship was a clever euphemism for slavery” in Kaieteur News, May 19, 2009. In his letter, he said that he presented evidentiary material that drew parallels between indentureship and slavery, while reiterating the significant distinctions that exist between these two historical atrocities. I assume that one of these historical atrocities also applied to the Portuguese.

The Portuguese came to Guyana as indentured laborers before the Indians and were housed in the same living space vacated by the freed slaves and performed their exact tasks.
Like the Indians, the majority of the Portuguese were illiterate, spoke no English, and came to a society that was not conducive to freedom of choice. Like the Indians, they represented little more than a commodity for trade and were arbitrarily assigned to plantations.

Like the Indians, the Portuguese relayed stories of floggings, fines, imprisonments, and inhumane treatment which were invoked for crimes such as “willful indolence,” “feigned illness,” and “impertinence.”
However, the Portuguese refused to renew their five-year indentureship after it expired because, unlike the Indians, they were not given a paid return passage that they could exchange for five acres of land if they renewed.
Kingsley Harrop