PORTUGESE DICTATOR DISTURBED

Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5285, 23 December 1946, Page 3

PORTUGESE DICTATOR DISTURBED

MOVES FOR DEM.OCRATIC GOVERNMENT Perturbed by th'e rising , tide of criticism and resentment against his Government, the unspectacular dictator of Portugal, Antonio Oliveira Salazar, has tighlened his grip on the country by curtly fcrbidding the liolding of 18 meetings by political and seini-political groups in Lisbon. The occasion was . the commemoration of the 306th anniversary of.Portugal's liberation from .Spain, a traditional day for.public rallies and oratory. Salazar's action tacitly confirmed rumours, hitherto officially denied, that public discontent with. his regime \yas becoming ai'ticulate, even active. In Oetober the spirit-of revolt blazed momentarily in Oporto, where a group of young Army offieers attejnpted to seize power in a badly-org-anised, casily-squasbed "march to glory." Salazar's well-trained propaganda organisation played down the incident and later announced that "complete cairn" again reigned in the country. Nevertheless, authoritative s'ources reported that this ahortive incident was followed hy 3,000 political arrests in Lisbon alone. Next. morning the people of Lisbon read in their newspapers the bald announcement, "Only. usual and official meetings will be permitted." They did not read that the previous night armed police paraded in the heart of the city. And no paper carried a report of • a big meeting held elsewhere in the city of ?.n illegal organisation, the Movement of Democratie Unity, where 3,000 persons cheered speakers who trenchantly criticised the Salazar regime and carried motions calling for the democratisation of the Government. The resolutions were: — (1) That the Government recognise the freedom and rights of individuals as granted in the Constitution. (2) That the Government grant an amnesty to all political prisongrs and allow exiled politicians to return. ■ (0) That the ieoncentration camp on Verde Island be abolished. (4) That the present National Assembly be dissolved and free elections held. Portugal still presents to the eyes of the European traveller the same wartime picture of fantastic prosperity and the cairn about which Salazar's submissive Press boasts. But there are strong 'undercurrepts of discontent. The Army is anxious for a military dietatorship; Royalists are intriguing1 for the restoraton to the throne oi" the 39-year-old Duke of Braganza, a cousin of former Kingi Manoel, and the (working classes, incensed by rising living- costs and the rationing of such iouds as flour, sugar, fish, bread and riee, look to the Movement of Democratie Unity for a New Deal.