That evening, Charlie got a call from Olivier. “I’ve been in contact with the MFA and fixed an appointment with one of their top people on Friday. I’m flying in from Paris on Wednesday and we can prepare for the meeting.”
Charlie agreed to meet him at the airport and invited Nick to come along. When he told Ellen, she marked it in her diary. “You do know that it’s May 1st, Labour Day, don’t you?”
EIGHTEEN
May 1st, 1974
Lisbon, Portugal
The car park at the airport was barred and Charlie had to leave the Peugeot in a nearby side street. His Triumph TR4 was only a two seater, so he’d borrowed Ellen’s car. He and Nick stopped in amazement in front of the airport building. There were a dozen tanks ranged around the roundabout in front of the arrivals exit. Several vans with loudspeakers fixed to their roofs were parked between the tanks. There was a cacophony of sound from the klaxons of those cars which had been allowed into the parking area. Dozens of soldiers stood in a circle in front of the crowds of people marching around, singing and carrying red flags, banners and placards. They were chanting at the top of their voices, “PCP, MFA, JUNTOS!”
Nick had to shout to be heard over the row. “What are they saying?”
“It’s the Communist Party. They’re demonstrating in favour of the Junta.”
The shouting and cheering increased in volume as the arrival doors opened and a group of men emerged. They were welcomed by the soldiers and two of them were embraced by several officers in turn. They helped the smaller of the two up on top of one of the tanks and gave him a microphone. He was a lean looking man, shorter than medium height, with a mane of white hair, dark eyebrows over a lined face. Handsome in an aquiline way.
The man struggled to be heard over the cheering of the crowd. They were heaving with excitement, shouting communist slogans, waving their banners and screaming, “Álvaro, Álvaro, Álvaro.”
He held his hands up until the crowd calmed down, then said, “Bom dia, Lisboa. I have come back home after fourteen years, to lead you to socialism, to equality, and to prosperity.” The uproar from the crowd escalated to a roar. Pausing to be heard after every few words, he spoke for five minutes, finally shouting the same slogan as the crowd, “PCP, MFA, JUNTOS!” The soldiers helped him back down as the crowd again erupted with roars of approval.
Finally the row diminished until Nick could be heard. “Who the hell is that?”
Charlie was looking around, counting and calculating in his logical fashion. He turned back to Nick, a worried look on his face. “That is Álvaro Cunhal, the leader of the PCP, the Portuguese Communist Party.”
“So how come he’s just flown into Lisbon? What’s the big deal?”
“The big deal is that he escaped from a Portuguese prison in 1960 and he’s been in exile in Moscow since then. Another big deal, Nick, is that there must be a couple of thousand supporters here and an army contingent to help him get his opening message across. Look at those banners and placards. How long do you reckon it took to prepare them, to organise this demonstration and to get the army to orchestrate it all? This must have been in preparation for months. And it’s certainly no coincidence that today is May 1st, Workers’ Day. This is not looking good. In fact, it’s looking bloody awful!”
“There’s Olivier.” The two men fought their way through the still raucous crowd to the doors where the rest of the passengers were finally emerging. They shook hands and Charlie picked up his suitcase and led the way out of the airport grounds to the car.
Olivier took his arm, “Guess who was sitting across the aisle from me. Álvaro Cunhal!”
“You just missed seeing his triumphant return ceremony. What was he doing in Paris?”
“Apparently he’s been in Prague for a couple of years and just came through Paris to get here. Flying first class. Tough life being a communist exile!”
Like many well educated Portuguese, Olivier spoke perfect, unaccented English. He had spent twelve years in boarding school and university in the UK before returning to Lisbon. After a few years in Aliança Portuguesa y Africana, which had been started by his father, who was still President of the group, he had taken over as Chief Executive and the business had never looked back. APA was now one of the leading commercial banks in Portugal and handled a large percentage of the trade between the African colonies and the rest of the world. The international trading was Charlie’s responsibility and he had built it up massively since joining the bank five years before.
Olivier continued his story as Nick drove them to the office. “But that’s not the strangest thing that happened to me on the flight.”
“You got laid by a communist supporter?”
“Well, almost as good. Was there a big, swarthy looking guy with Cunhal at the arrivals? Walked with a limp?”
Charlie could still picture the scene. “He and Cunhal got hugs and kisses from the army.”
“Well the big guy’s name is Alberto Pires da Silva. He told me the most incredible story I’ve ever heard.”
“How come, did you already know him?”
“Never seen him before, but he was sitting next to me, and Cunhal was on the other side of the aisle. He had three or four glasses of champagne and decided he loved me like a brother. “Turns out da Silva is Cunhal’s bodyguard, has been since 1960.”
“1960? Isn’t that when…?”
“Exactly. When Cunhal escaped from prison. That’s the incredible story and I got it right from the horse’s mouth.” Olivier settled back in the car seat. “This chap, da Silva, was one of Cunhal’s guards in Peniche Prison. The only thing is, the Portuguese didn’t know that he is actually Angolan and had been working for the Russians for years.”
“He told you this? He’s crazy.”
“Charlie, these people think they’ve won the jackpot. They’ve returned from a very comfortable exile. They’re probably getting paid gazillions by the Russians and now Portugal is their oyster. Did you see those crowds, the army? They’ve got it made.”
“So, da Silva was strutting his stuff to the first person he met after he’d had a skin full?”
“And by lucky chance I was the guy in the next seat.”
Nick pulled the car up in Charlie’s reserved space and they walked into the offices together. Olivier put his key into the elevator lock and pressed six for the executive level. Isabel, his secretary, greeted her boss, installed them in his sumptuous office and took his suitcase.
“Can you fix a meeting of senior staff in the conference room in an hour, Isabel?”
“Four o’clock? As good as done.” She brought in three coffees then retreated to her guard post and they heard her start calling on the interphone.
“Right. Let’s have part two of the Cunhal mystery story.” Charlie took his coffee, lit up a cigarette and sat in one of the armchairs opposite the others.
“OK. It seems that da Silva is a dyed in the wool communist and was a member of the outlawed Angolan Communist Party. The PCP had also been outlawed and in the 1950s, hundreds of people in Portugal and in the colonies were imprisoned by Salazar for communist activities. Some of them were sent to the political prison colony in TarRaffal, in Cabo Verde. Talk about Devil’s Island. It was a hell hole with no escape. Cunhal was lucky. Even though he was the de facto leader of the PCP, he’d been in Peniche prison, beside Estoril, since 1949.
“Da Silva told me that in 1958, Agostinho Neto, the leader of the MPLA, the Marxist rebel group, sent him from Angola to Lisbon with the best references that could be forged. He got a job with the military prison service and ended up guarding Cunhal in Peniche.” Olivier shook his head in disbelief. “And all this time he was spying for the Russians and was a go between with them, the PCP, the MPLA and the communist leaders who were in prison.”
“So they were being guarded by an Angolan Communist who was a Russian spy.” Charlie looked at Nick, a wry smile on his face, as if to say, I told you so.
“In 1960, and this is the scary
part, he helped to organise an escape plan to get Cunhal and the other PCP leaders out. Not just out of Peniche prison, but right out of Portugal. There were about fifteen of them and if what da Silva told me is true, I have to say it was a brilliant plan. Dangerous, but brilliant. A bit like those 007 spy movies they’re making.
“The Russians, can you believe, sent a submarine to pick them up. Da Silva and his communist comrades killed the guards in a gun fight and he got Cunhal and the other survivors to the sea. Da Silva almost got his leg shot off in the process. Then a fishing boat took them out to a Russian submarine. A bloody Russian submarine, in the Atlantic, just up the coast from Estoril, and it shipped them off to Moscow, all of them!”
Olivier calmed himself down. “Apparently Manolo de Siqueira, Cunhal’s deputy, was killed and I don’t know what happened to the others, but Cunhal and da Silva’s families joined them and they spent 10 years in Moscow and then went to live it up in Prague.”
“But why was Cunhal so valuable to the Russians?” Charlie was asking himself why an insignificant Portuguese communist politician was worth the risk of sending a submarine to cruise off the coast of Estoril in the middle of the Cold War. “There must be more to this than da Silva told you. Cunhal had been in prison for eleven years, supposedly out of all contact with his party. It doesn’t make any sense to run such a risk to take him back to Russia to cool his heels, doing bugger all there for another ten years. Not to mention Prague!”
Olivier shook his head in puzzlement. “After twenty years out of circulation you’d wonder what remaining value he’d have. One thing I do remember, is that in 1961, Cunhal went from de facto boss to actual boss of the PCP, when the previous leader, Gonçalves, died in TarRaffal.”
“And do you remember when the rebels started rattling their sabers in the colonies?”
“I do. One of my uncles worked for the radio station in Luanda, and he was killed in the first wave of violence. It was in 1961. I think Mozambique and Guinea were not very long after. In any case we were fighting in all of our colonies by the middle sixties.”
“So, Cunhal escapes to Moscow in 1960. In 1961 he becomes King of the PCP and suddenly all hell breaks out in the Portuguese colonies. And we know that it’s the Russians who are financing most of the fighting there. Quite a coincidence, eh?”
“And today, fourteen years later, he gets the “Welcome Home” reception from the new army Junta and the outlawed and supposedly non-existent Portuguese Communist Party!” Nick looked over at Charlie. “You weren’t wrong my friend. You had it right on the nose.”
“I wish I had been wrong. This business must have been in preparation for years. The army captains and everyone else are being duped. There was no revolution. This is a Russian-orchestrated communist move to take over a European country.”
“And there’s something else I haven’t told you,” Olivier added. “Da Silva said the signal to start the revolution was given by two songs played on the radio, just before and just after midnight. These guys in Prague knew all about it. They’ve had their trip prepared for months.”
He looked worriedly at the others, trying desperately to find a positive spin to the situation. “The only thing is, we must never forget that there are opportunities with every regime, with every situation, with every change in circumstances. We have to recognise the authority of the new order and we have to work with it and not against it. This could be a blessing in disguise. We’ve already fixed up a meeting with the Junta, so let’s get our act together and see how we can help them. It’s the only way to help ourselves.”
At the executive briefing meeting later, despite Olivier’s calm demeanor and motivating words of encouragement, Charlie noticed that some of the company managers were distinctly jumpy about the recent events. Jorge Gomez, the general manager, could hardly sit still, looking as if he wanted to get out of the meeting as quickly as possible. Other executives were more sanguine, some of them contributing fairly positive remarks.
I wonder which of them we should worry about the most? Charlie asked himself.
NINETEEN
May, 1974
Belem, near Lisbon, Portugal
The Palace of Belem, a magnificent complex of buildings on the bank of the Tagus between Lisbon and Estoril, dates back to the 16th and 17th century. Amazingly, the buildings were spared during the Great Earthquake of 1755, which destroyed a large part of Lisbon. The palace is the official residence of the President of Portugal and is where the highest ranking ministers and government officials of the country have their offices.
Olivier and Charlie were stopped at a recently erected guard post to produce their papers and have their appointment confirmed. There were so many soldiers and military vehicles around, it looked more like an army barracks than a historical building. They were taken up from the majestic entrance hall to the second floor where a young officer led them along the corridor. Another officer welcomed them into a palatial room, full of antique furnishings and paintings which must have needed a team of housekeepers to look after. Huge windows with heavy drapes gave superb views straight across the Tagus. It was so clear that they could see the unspoiled beaches of Caparica on the other side of the river.
Major Manuel Nunes Furtado was a self-confident man in his early thirties, with a luxuriant, British Air Force style moustache. His uniform was so crisply starched and pressed it must have hurt him to sit down. He seemed pleased to be able to show off his English when Charlie apologised for his limited Portuguese.
Olivier gave him a short description of APA and its activities. “I think you’ll agree, Major Furtado, that it has to be in the interests of the Junta to maintain Portugal’s economic activity, and especially exports. The new Government must show the world that the revolution has been a positive move, not just for the population, but for the country’s finances.”
Furtado wasn’t impressed by this not so subtle hint of the danger of a run on the currency. He had fulfilled his duty by removing the corrupt government and giving the country back to the people and he didn’t seem to be very concerned about the consequences.
“That may be true, but you are speaking from the point of view of a capitalist. It will be up to the new Government to decide whether capitalism is still a viable policy for our country. I’m not convinced it is.”
Charlie tried talking about Portuguese-African relations, but here Furtado was even less impressed. “Our intention is to stop the senseless slaughter of our comrades in Africa. Portuguese soldiers have no business in Angola, Mozambique or any place outside of Portugal and we do not intend to continue with the murderous colonialisation policy that has killed so many of our compatriots. We will bring them safely back home just as soon as we are able.”
The meeting ended after just twenty-five minutes and the officer led them back down to the entrance hall. He assured them that he was at their service at any time and left them.
“Well that was a ‘Major Success’ if you’ll excuse the pun,” Olivier said as they headed towards the exit. Charlie was just as disappointed, but he said nothing. Just then the main doors opened and three men entered the palace.
Olivier stepped forward and addressed the tallest of the three in Portuguese. “Bom dia, Alberto. A pleasure to see you again.” He put out his hand.
Da Silva was wearing the uniform of a major of the Portuguese army. He hesitated, then smiled agreeably and shook his hand. “Olivier, welcome to Belem. This is Sr. Álvaro Cunhal.”
The smaller man smiled reservedly and shook hands.
“And this is Major Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho, the hero of the Portuguese Revolution.” The major bowed low, basking in the praise. His tunic was garnished with a dozen medals.
Olivier introduced Charlie then they continued speaking in Portuguese. Cunhal was warming up a little, since Olivier was complimenting him on his return to Portugal. Alberto seemed genuinely pleased to see him again and after a short conversation they shook hands and exchanged cards.
B
efore turning to leave, the Angolan leaned down to listen to Cunhal, then said, “Olivier, we are having a small celebration dinner tomorrow night, at the Ritz Hotel. Perhaps you’d care to join us at 8:00 pm?”
“I’d be delighted, Alberto. Muito obrigado. Até amanhã. See you tomorrow.”
“Thanks for not getting me invited.” Charlie opened the car door and climbed in. “The last thing I need is a cram course in Portuguese. I’ve got enough on my plate.”
“Did you see that guy Carvalho bow down? He had so many medals I thought he was going to collapse on the floor.”
Charlie laughed, “Well done, boss. You jumped in there like an insurance salesman with his foot in the door.”
“Well, this could be the break I’ve been talking about. Work with them and not against them. Let’s see what happens. You never know, we could come out smelling of roses.”
TWENTY
May – July, 1974
Lisbon, Portugal
“The situation is even more complicated than I thought.” Olivier was with Charlie in the office, reviewing his Saturday night party. “Spinola has been forced to share power with the Junta, the Armed Forces Movement and the Communist Party. That’s one hell of a committee. They’re going to build a camel at this rate. But I’ve met them all now, so if we play our cards right we can ally ourselves with whoever comes out on top.”
“Was there anything specific that you could get progressed?”
“They’re all concerned about the problems in Angola and Mozambique, but for quite different reasons. On one side there’s Spinola and the other army factions who want to save soldiers’ lives and get them out of Africa. On the other there’s Cunhal, who’s backing the rebels who are killing them. He asked me a lot about our businesses over there, especially our contacts in Angola.”
[African Diamonds 01.0] The Angolan Clan Page 12
