2024-04-15 12:05:18
This is the first time that Contacto has created a special magazine to sell on newsstands, but the reason deserves every effort. Portugal (and the Portuguese) celebrate a round date on April 25th. It’s 50 years of democracy, freedom of expression and the end of the Colonial War. A date that affected everyone: those who lived in the country, those who fought in Africa, those who fled to the diaspora.
The magazine, a bilingual edition in Portuguese and French, will be on sale in the main kiosks in Luxembourg from next Saturday, April 20th.
The cover of the Contacto special magazine. © Credits: Marc Wilwert
To get here, the Contacto team spent long weeks investigating, photographing and recovering long-forgotten memories. In the magazine you can read for the first time the story of a resistance cell to the Portuguese dictatorship that operated from the Grand Duchy. And it involved the efforts of several Portuguese and Luxembourgers. An emotional account of the collaboration that was formed to stop a cruel regime.
And because the Revolution did not just happen on national territory, we revisit the memories of the regime’s main concentration camp. Tarrafal, in Cape Verde, still had many stories left to tell. Portuguese photographer João Pina discovered a treasure in an old shoebox and shares with us his vision of an intolerable time.
We also contextualize the gray days of the dictatorship. We tell you what life was like in the country before the revolution. The beatings and torture, the misery and hunger, the war and human rights that no one respected.
Finally, we remember two Captains of April. Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho, the man who thought about the 25th of April and then fell into disgrace, being arrested for terrorist activity. And Salgueiro Maia, personalized on the body of his daughter Catarina, who started her own revolution from Luxembourg.
Radio Latina joins the party
On the 18th, Contacto journalists Jorge Araújo, Madalena Queirós and Ricardo J. Rodrigues will be at the microphones of Rádio Latina to explain behind the scenes of the preparation of this magazine – and also of the coverage that the newspaper is preparing to celebrate its 50th anniversary of the 25th of April.
The importance of the date is also not lost on Luxembourg society. On the 23rd, there will be a great debate at 6:30 pm at the Cercle Cité about the importance of April 25th. At the table will be historians Fernando Rosas, a man on the left, and Jaime Nogueira Pinto, on the right, to offer a broad vision of the days of the Revolution.
The exhibition poster at the National Museum. © Credits: DR
On the 26th, the exhibition opens at the National Museum “The revolution of 1974 – from the streets of Lisbon to Luxembourg”. It will be on view until January 5th next year – and is curated by Luxembourg historians Régis Moes and Isabelle Maas.
Now yes, the Portuguese can celebrate the 25th of April in Luxembourg
On April 25, 1974, the Armed Forces Movement occupied Lisbon and overthrew the dictatorial regime of the Estado Novo, which had governed the country for 48 years. The coup took place without practically spilling a drop of blood and was marked by the population’s enormous support for the military. The Carnation Revolution would end up having a great international impact and would end up influencing the fall of Francoism in Spain.
2024-04-15 12:05:18