THE LOOKOUT | Jaime Fernandes spent the 25th of April in prison in Caxias

Jaime Fernandes, born in Advagar, in the municipality of Santarém, was one of the more than ten thousand opponents of the Estado Novo dictatorship who were imprisoned in Forte de Caxias and the first political prisoner to be allowed to leave the outer courtyard of the sadly famous prison. , one day after the military coup of April 25, 1974. A moment of exhilarating joy documented with image and text in the book “Cadeia de Caxias – a fascist repression and the struggle for freedom”, which was presented this month in Santarém.
The former political prisoner, born in 1947, says that, on April 25th, the regime had already been deposed and the prisoners still didn’t know anything. It wasn’t until ten o’clock at night that a coded message, using a car’s horn, announced that there had been a coup d’état. But without clarifying which tendency, what left the prisoners in shock: it could either be from the MFA or the extreme right. “We spent a terrible night, anguished”, recalled the former political prisoner, who on April 11th presented, at the Sociedade Recreativa Operária de Santarém, his book “Em Abril Águas Mil” about resistance to the dictatorship.
Caxias’ political prisoners were only released in the early hours of April 27, due to disagreements within the Armed Forces Movement (MFA). “It was a huge joy,” he recalls. “There were a lot of people outside waiting and that’s when the party started”, he says. The images of that early morning next to the Caxias prison went around the world and Jaime Fernandes was one of the protagonists.

Youth fighting against dictatorship
Jaime Fernandes, a retired teacher who currently lives in Ericeira and no longer has a family in Santarém, reminds O MIRANTE that in the village the family lived from commerce and agriculture. After attending primary school he continued his studies in Santarém, where the family went to live after purchasing Pensão Lusitânia. Many of the friendships created in the village last to this day. “Despite the physical separation for decades, when I meet some of these friends it is as if I had been with them the day before. I still have many memories of the village,” he describes.
During his youth in Santarém, Jaime Fernandes says he experienced exciting times. “It was one of the richest periods of my life and it marked me forever. It was certainly the period in which I felt most useful to society due to the fact that I contributed with all my abilities to the overthrow of the dictatorship”. There were many young people united in these struggles that were taking place everywhere: “It was at the Círculo Cultural Scalabitano, it was at the Cineclube, it was at the Académica, it was at the Caixeiros, it was at the cafes… The gatherings, the poetry sessions, the debates of the films, plays, conferences, debates”.
Jaime Fernandes participated in the electoral campaigns for the democratic opposition, integrated into the democratic electoral commissions of the district of Santarém, in 1969, and of the district of Lisbon, in 1973, here after having spent his first period in prison. In 1971, while carrying out his military service, he was arrested by the political police and sentenced to 22 months in prison, which he served at Forte de Caxias and at the Military Prison of Santarém. He would be arrested again, in Forte de Caxias, from where he would be released by the Armed Forces Movement on April 27, 1974.
Today he looks at his city and considers that it would have been important to take advantage of its historical capital in the field of arts, especially in the areas of music, theater and ballet, to which others could later be added, such as plastic arts and cinema , and make Santarém a great arts center. He considers it important to locate university residences in the historic center, for its revitalization, as well as improving rail transport between Santarém and Lisbon.

“There is always someone who says no”
After retiring, Jaime Fernandes became more available and, in addition to writing, he got closer to Santarém, as well as his village. “In the three books I wrote, the city of Santarém and my village are always clearly present”, he emphasizes. He says that Santarém has known how to honor the memory of the 25th of April and Salgueiro Maia, although it is always possible to do more. “I have been following with some frustration the very slow pace of the founding of the promised Abril Museum. As time passes, memories and objects become lost in time and space, impoverishing their contents”, he considers.
As for young people’s relationship with the 25th of April, he states: “Young people are dazzled by new technologies and what’s new they bring. And that wouldn’t be a bad thing, on the contrary, if the contents weren’t alienating. The great powers, who control all of this, are using these new tools for their benefit, entertaining, entertaining, entertaining… so that their powers are not called into question. But before there were other forms of alienation. However, there is always someone who says no…”.