The committee dealing with the 50th anniversary commemorations of April 25 has already received “more than 200 proposals for initiatives” across the country and they are “proposals with great dynamism” and “great imagination”, which show that there is a ” willingness to bring April to the streets” and “into the homes of all Portuguese”. Interviewed by Lusa, the commissioner for commemorations, historian Maria Inácia Rezola revealed initiatives she plans to put into practice this year.
One of the examples he gave is that of a campaign to be launched on social networks, especially aimed at young people and entitled #NãoPodias, which will remember what could not be done before April 25. You can’t kiss in the street, vote freely, disagree, travel, meet, be European or access health for free are some of the #Could’s that the committee will remember.
This April will commemorate the Congress of the Democratic Opposition held in Aveiro in April 1973, a year before the Carnation Revolution. “While we are going to hold two afternoons of reflection in Lisbon on the themes discussed in 1973 at the University of Aveiro, with primary and secondary schools as well as university students, we are going to debate the current themes that concern young people, as disturbing as environmental issues, as issues of inequality, of exclusion,” he described.
Then, on May 1, the following Labor Day, will be the opening of an exhibition entitled “Unidos Venceremos”, on “the strikes and protests in the last line of the regime”, an exhibition curated by Pacheco Pereira, which will form a hub in Lisbon and another in Barreiro.
Until the end of the year, the First Plenary Assembly of the Captains’ Movement (September 9, 1973) will still be convened, which brought together 95 captains, 39 lieutenants and two ensigns, later regarded as the founding meeting of the Captains’ Movement. renamed Armed Forces Movement (MFA).
The reunion will take place in the place where it took place 50 years ago, on Monte do Sobral, in Alcáçovas, 30 kilometers from Évora (and today a rural tourism enterprise). In December, another meeting of the movement will be commemorated, held in Óbidos on December 1, 1973, “so decisive and so important” because it was there that “began to foresee that the coup was the way to end the regime “.
Rezola said he did not believe the rise of the far right could affect the celebrations. And all dates related to April should be marked, whether they unite or not: “More than whether they unite or not, I think the fundamental thing is that they don’t fade into oblivion and that there is information. “
Thus, dates such as March 11, 1975 (Spinolist intent) or November 25 of the same year (marking the end of the revolutionary period) will be evoked. For the historian, it is about the protagonists of history leaving their testimony to younger people. It is a way of avoiding commemorating April 25 as if it were “prehistory” or that it “resembles the celebration of October 5” in 1910, the date of the founding of the Republic and which says “so little for young people” .
Source: DN
