Remembering the Portuguese who arrived on May 3, 1835

May 04, 2017 Letters

Dear Editor,
Last Sunday, I attended a very informative forum on Ethiopia at the Pan African Gardens (Merriman’s Mall). The presentations by Dr. Norman Ng-A-Qui and Mr. Eric Phillips were extremely useful, but the questions from the audience suggest that we need to do much more to share our history, particularly with our young people.
It is my considered opinion that if we knew and understood more of our history, it would be a major contributory factor to achieving our objective of one people, one nation, one destiny and advancing the call of His Excellency the President David Arthur Granger and the coalition move for national cohesion.
We need to know where we came from to better understand who we are as a people. This will give us the intellectual vigor for genuine harmony, peace and love as a people. After all, in Guyana, we are less than a million people and it is important that we share our trials, tribulations and triumphs.
Yesterday, May 3, marked the official arrival of the batch of forty (40) Portuguese to British Guiana. They arrived in 1835 aboard vessel Louisa Baillie- so today we should celebrate Portuguese Arrival Day. Earlier, the year before, in keeping with the machinations and malevolence of the plantocracy, they realized that after emancipation (1834) and the four year period of African apprenticeship, the former slaves were unlikely to continue as labourers on the plantations. The planters faced another problem they did not want in the colony- a majority of blacks and so the attempt was to balance the ethnic equation, in other words, to make the British Guiana population, consist of more persons from Europe (meaning white) and so they sought to bring in Germans and English men among others. The Portuguese, as we celebrate Portuguese Arrival Day, made a significant contribution to the development of our country.
The first Portuguese who arrived to work on the plantation came from an area where there was agriculture, but severe poverty. Later, they were joined by persons who came from the troubled Lebanon. The Portuguese did not do well in the harsh conditions of plantation field work.
After shying away from the ‘riggers or the hardship’ of field work on the estate, they turned to business as major importers and retail outlets. Like every group on earth, they were the good ones and the not so good ones. They had incidents that caused what is known as-‘A Cent Bread Riot’, ‘Angel Gabriel Riot’ and others. This behavioral pattern allowed certain politicians to refer to the group as ‘Portuguese Cabal’ and by another ‘Potagee Mafia’.
My recollection goes to my childhood days in Charlestown, living in my mother’s yard; was a delightful, helpful and decent Portuguese family- Joseph DeBarros, his wife and children. I developed a fondness for Uncle Joe and his family-the eldest child was Anita. Uncle Joe, for me, was a second father who reared bees in the yard and would spoil me by giving me the honeycomb before he had expressed the honey. One day I had my belly full and then had a combination of cow’s milk and honey.The excess and combination did not do my digestive system any good, and I pondered whether the life in heaven of milk and honey made any sense.
Beyond Uncle Joe, they had many good and caring persons of Portuguese and Lebanese extractions. The Mekdeci’s were really from the Lebanese side and represents a family who I consider great and gracious patriotic Guyanese. Also, there was the Vieira’s family, headed by Joe Vieira of Houston Estates, who produced a family of entrepreneurs- a great credit to our country.
This letter will not attempt to identify the many persons of Portuguese extractions who helped to move our country forward, but in the political arena, we cannot ignore Peter Stanislaus D’Aguiar, Dr. Ann Jardine, Christopher Kit Nascimento, John Gabriel Joaquin, Bonny Fernandes (of Carifesta Festival City Fame), Joe DeFreitas and Eugiene Francis Correira.
I salute our Portuguese brothers and sisters at home and abroad as we celebrate Portuguese Arrival Day and look forward to those who migrated in the 50’s and 60’s to return to contribute to a good life for all Guyanese.
Hamilton Green OR, JP

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