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In this, Goa too has probably kept up with the old 'mother country'. FN
RURAL POOR OF PORTUGAL DEVASTATED BY 'PROGRESS'
The agrarian poor of Portugal have been largely abandoned in the national
quest for Western-style modernity and progress. The consequences, as
described in the following article, are devastating.
By Eduardo Goncalves
My cousin Alvaro was a man of few words and a permanent wry grin. He had an
effortless easy manner, a bottomless warmth. When my elderly father broke
his leg last year, it was Alvaro who took countless days off work to
shuttle him between hospitals, clinics, doctors and physiotherapists. It
was a simple act of kindness for which I shall always be in his debt.
I never had a chance to thank him and never will. Inexplicably, three weeks
ago this weekend Alvaro took his own life.
The funeral was the most heartbreaking event of my life. The whole family
came from far and wide, united in grief and shock. In between tears and
long embraces was the inevitable question. Why had a healthy middle-aged
man surrounded by a loving family done this?
Alvaro was the epitome of achievement within our family. He had made a
success of his career, had a beautiful home and a holiday residence by the
beach in a fashionable area north of Lisbon. He was liked by everyone at
work and had no history of depression.
We will never know with any certainty the reason for his suicide, as he
left no farewell note and no obvious clues. But it appears Alvaro had begun
to develop financial worries. The Lisbon stock exchange, in common with
markets around the world, had taken a severe battering since 11 September.
Previously Alvaro had been encouraged to invest. He had done so heavily.
His shares plummeted in value. Suddenly, it seemd to him, everything was
falling apart. His family's security was at risk, the foundations of the
lifestyle he had encouraged them to enjoy were about to vanish. A model of
success, Alvaro was about to be exposed as a failure. Or so it appears he
thought.
It is a tragic story that was unthinkable a generation ago, but which is
becoming more typical in modern Portugal. Thirty years ago, this country
was little more than a feudal society - Western Europe's poorest nation,
closed off to the outside world by a dictatorship that concentrated wealth
and power in the hands of a tiny few. The vast majority of the people were
agrarian peasants.
It took a bloodless coup in 1974 to bring democracy. With it, though, the
floodgates opened. Coca Cola had been banned by the old regime. Now,
television brought images of Portugal's rich European neighbours. Until
then the Algarve coastline had been a string of fishing villages.
Subsequently, it was to be the subject of one of the biggest and fastest
tourist expansion ever seen. Roads were paved and car ownership exploded.
European subsidies for growing cash crops became available after Portugal's
accession to the EU in 1986, and large irrigation dams were built. A new
middle-class emerged, and cheap plots of land were sold for city workers to
build villas in the suburbs. There seemed to be no limits to the new
possibilities, and the country was encouraged to consume. Even under the
Kyoto agreement, Portugal was allowed to increase the greenhouse emissions.
But as the country rushed to play catch-up its social fabric stretched and
began to tear. The English word 'stress' has become part of the vocabulary
of Portugal's new middle-class. For the rural poor, largely abandoned in
the national quest for Western-style modernity and progress, the cost has
been devastating. The lure of high earnings has drawn an entire generation
of able-bodied workers out of the countryside into cities and tourist
resorts - either within Portugal or further afield in France, Germany and
Switzerland.
The tragedy of Alvaro has not just been repeated - it has been repeated
many times over. As the old
are left alone, isolated on hill farms - their extended families having
long departed, the desperation of loneliness has led many to take their own
lives. The rural communities of southern Portugal now hold an appalling
record: the highest official suicide rates in the world.
My own sprawling parish is one of these communities. It has a population of
around 700. A generation ago 3,000 people lived in these hills. My farm is
surrounded by over half a dozen abandoned houses, and I have just three
neighbours. At least once a year the village's handful of shops close as
the entire population files along the road to the cemetery in memory of yet
another neighbour who decided he could take it no longer.
By the river that runs in the valley below there is an old cottage. It is a
beautiful whitewashed house, with a lovingly-tendered orchard to the front.
Otters leave their marks on the stepping stones across the water, and
terrapins bashfully dash for cover when you approach.
One day the old man who lived alone there waved cheerfully across the river
as I passed. Days later, he hung himself from an orange tree. In the
now-abandoned cottage, there are a few old toys. They are the only evidence
that a large family once grew up and lived in the house, that children
played by the river.
It was my mother's 70th birthday yesterday. My sister and I had planned a
huge surprise party. In the end, we organised a much smaller affair with
just the most immediate family. No one was in the mood for festivities.
Throughout modern Portugal entire communities are painfully scarred.
Once-strong extended family structures are cracking under pressures that
were unheard of 30 years ago. The desperation of loneliness and the fear of
failure are new social phenomena that have emerged virtually overnight, and
which we, as a family and a country, were not prepared for.
I am left with an overriding fear that I have failed both Alvaro and my
neighbour. But as I try to come to terms with these events, I realise that
people like myself who are lucky enough to have a platform from which to
influence public opinion must use that position to honour the memory of
these victims of progress, to warn others and to try to fight the decay
that undermines all our communities.
Farewell, Alvaro, Um grande abraco eterno do teu primo amigo. - Third World
Network Features
-ends-
About the writer: Eduardo Goncalves is a Portuguese journalist and a
regular contributor to The Ecologist, in which the above article first
appeared (December 2002/January 2003, 'Rest in Peace').
