Dear Sir,

The Portuguese family of Bermuda moved from being third-class citizens to first-class in a little more than 40 years.

From a beginnings of 1849 up to 1965, which is approximately 120 years’ later, they still had not penetrated the socio-economic structure presented by a formidable black merchant class and the white establishment and had remained the third class in Bermuda society economic strata. All that would change with an axiomatic shift brought on by a new political dynamic, which would give everyone the vote.

The masters of our society knew that the Bermudian white population was too small and the momentum of the community was socially and economically unsustainable for them as an absolute minority. Not enough of them as workers to fill the middle class with labour and trades and not enough voters particularly with an ostracised group of Portuguese classified as non-white who in some ways was a victim of both the black and white community.

So what did Sir Henry Tucker and crew do?

First they reclassified the Portuguese as white. That wasn’t going to be enough to end the century-old antipathy between them, so the slogan must have been “I’m going to make you love me”. Immediately with the reclassification came a huge cash infusion, with hundreds of thousands of pounds given as investment capital to many aspiring Portuguese businessmen.

It was indeed an undeclared affirmative action aimed at building the Portuguese community while simultaneously undoing the black merchant establishment, which up to mid-1960 was, after 140 years of entrepreneurial development, still very manifest. All of this triggered the “Am I Being Used?” speech of Clarence James and the crushed UBP “black caucus”.

The economic exercise was cold, calculating and belligerent, as whole industries once owned by the black merchants were financed as a takeover by the banks.

The 1970s saw the beginning of the end of black dominance in the construction industry, which up until then only saw a few Portuguese hands in the trades.

With a pending building boom the banks predetermined which groups would profit from the building industry. So with a sublime structure assisted by Government’s own policy, which had grade A, B and C contractors, it was assured that both private and public sector contracts went to certain companies. By 1993 the job of annihilating any hold on the construction industry by black contractors was completed when all the banks in a conspiracy targeted and destroyed 72 of the most prominent black businessmen, most of whom in, or some way related to, the construction industry. Systematically calling their mortgages, bankrupting their business, who didn’t die from stress, fled the country or remained humbled by a multi-institutional onslaught too strong to withstand.

My antagonist will say “no, their success was because the Portuguese had a good work ethic and worked hard.”

They had that same work ethic from 1849 to 1965 but were still third. Look at it from a graph and you will see a flat line, gently curving upward from 1849 to 1965, then suddenly take a steep curve upward from 1965 onward. Newton’s Law says “every body will remain at a state of rest or uniform motion unless acted upon by another force”.

Forces were applied and lets call it affirmative action.

Another might say “That was the UBP”, well the PLP under Dr Brown who perhaps was saddened by the dismal performance of an attempt at the Berkeley school to give blacks a favour, had to take the position ‘not under my watch’, he must have wanted a guarantee of successful ventures, hence every job of consequence handled under him was handed to a Portuguese firm. We had black equipment operators with millions of dollars worth of equipment sitting in their yard gathering rust while Portuguese contractor’s equipment was working overtime. So two bites at the cherry between both political parties.

Although the collusion with the establishment and the first generation of recipients of this affirmative action was diabolic and they both knew what was happening, I am not angry at the Portuguese — they are not to blame for accepting a hand up.

In fact all my children have Portuguese blood and proud of it. It’s a living lesson about empowerment and how it works.

With empowerment the education and lifestyle of the family improves, values shift and the tendency towards criminal behaviour for whole communities is avoided.

Similar to that deliberate exercise beginning in 1965 with the Portuguese, the black community needs affirmative action with leadership. It’s not a snatch-and-grab four-year exercise; it will take 40 to 50 years to rebuild the black community.

It is capital that makes or breaks a society, any observant eye will see it was the manipulation of capital that has brought us to where we are and it will be the manoeuvre of capital that will get us to a more equitable place.

KHALID WASI