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"Belief, and the Will to Win"
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Grupo dos Amigos de Olivença"Crer e Querer para Vencer"
Forum Olivença
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Jornal PracetaLATEST NEWS - 14 May to 20 May 2002
19/May/2002
Source:Mário Rui Simões Rodrigues/InforOlivençaNet
-Article also published in the Jornal Digital, 18/May/2002
A Country is born, another that seems to be dying...
On 20 May 2002, will mark for posterity, the independence of Timor Lorosae, as the happy outcome of more than two decades of occupation, of killings and massacres, perpetrated by Indonesia, to which the Timorese always managed to oppose with courage, determination and a desire for liberty.
On the same day in which the last overseas Portuguese territory in Oceania is born, the new State of XXI, in Portugal, one of the oldest States in the world, it's 201 years of foreign occupation and territorial amputation. It was on 20 May 1801, that Spain occupied Olivença, a territory that Spain has yet to give back despite having signed the Final Act of the Treaty of Vienna.
In closing the "Imperial Cycle" with the selfdetermination of the people of the Portuguese Timor - a few years after handing over the territory of Macau to the People's Republic of China - and now that Portugal is once again reduced (with the exception of the Azores, Madeira, including the Selvagens islands) to its medieval dimensions, perhaps the Portuguese ought to be urgently taking advantage of this time to start a deep reflection about our Territory and especially about our selfdetermination and independence.
Ironically, on the same day, 20 May, when the Portuguese without any colonial nostalgia but instead with joy seeing the birth of one more Lusophonic State, says goodbye to its old province of Timor, and in which, without any official remembrance or collective conscience, another anniversary goes by of the invasion of irredentist Olivença lands, the Spanish Prime Minister Aznar is in England negotiating the future of Gibraltar, trying to fulfill the objective defined a year ago for Spain and the United Kingdom to reach up to the summer 2002, an agreement to co-share sovereignty over the Rock.
In this introspection, individual and collective that for the Portuguese, and on the Portuguese People is imposed - at a time of global internationalism, European federalism, the Iberianisation of the Peninsula and the Castilianisation of the Portuguese language space - that send us serious challenges, possibly lethal... - perhaps we might correctly begin with these simple but not unimportant questions:
What is the reason that Spain, having recognised the validity of the Treaty of Utrecht and British sovereignty over Gibraltar, continues to claim the Rock, while Portugal, that refuses the validity of the Treaty of Badajoz and does not recognise Spanish sovereignty over Olivença does nothing to claim that territory?
What were the motives of our diplomacy in the first 10 years of the occupation of Timor to be completely petrified and be party to the integration of that territory in Indonesia, but when it comes to Olivença will do nothing but be an accumplice and stay cowardly silent, stirring only to put down the actions of Portuguese citizens and media organisations who attempt to undertake to denounce this scandal, when, instead we see Spanish diplomacy frenetically acting in every corner of the world in defending such a small place, when it doesn't have any legal rights?
How can it be explained that our leaders, independently of the parties to which they belong, instead of defending the interests of our national rights appear to be mere agents of foreign powers and especially Spain?
What could justify the sad fact that Spain, in the last ten years, has overtaken Portugal in almost all the economic-social indicators and that the neighbouring country is looking to be more like a medium world power, meanwhile Portugal moves between stagnation and decline, living in the most vile stage of erasement and annulment of its multi age-old History?On the day when officially is born Timor Lorosae, perhaps it ought to be right and proper to look at Portugal, a Country that -seemingly happy or resigned with the way it has gone, with regard to transforming itself into a simple region of Europe and a mere province of Spain - appears to us as if it's dying...Watch out! If we do not amend our ways, Portugal could really die...And who will be to blame?...At the end of 9 centuries of existence, free and independent, does our generation want to be the executioner of Portugal? Long Live Timor! But also, Long Live Portugal!
