Headquarters of the newspaper República (Rua da Misericórdia)

Under the Estado Novo (“New State”), República gave a voice to the democratic opposition.⁴ It stood at no. 116 Rua da Misericórdia, almost opposite the censorship office, which had been working at no. 125 since 22 September 1969.⁶ Women of the opposition also wrote for the paper: the memoirs of the suffragist Maria Veleda appeared in its pages in 1950,⁷ and Helena Neves, banned from teaching after being arrested in 1969, coordinated its supplement Presença da Mulher (Women’s Presence).⁸ Maria Teresa Horta was another of its contributors.⁹

In mid-April 1974, the journalist Álvaro Guerra, a link between MFA officers and the civilian opposition, secured the cooperation of the paper’s core team: the editor, Raul Rego, and the journalists Álvaro Belo Marques, Carlos Albino, Fernando Assis Pacheco, José Jorge Letria and Vítor Direito.⁶ It was Carlos Albino whom Álvaro Guerra asked, on 23 April, for a song for the programme Limite on Rádio Renascença; out of that conversation came “Grândola”.² In the 14:00 edition of the 24th, República published a short note, headed “Limite”, saying that the programme had become “a radio slot that is compulsory listening”.⁶³

On 25 April, Raul Rego refused to send the proofs to the “Prior Examination”, and the paper came out with the headline “The Armed Forces have taken power” (As Forças Armadas tomaram o poder) and a line at the foot of the front page: “This newspaper has not been vetted by any Censorship Commission” (Este jornal não foi visado por qualquer Comissão de Censura).⁶ At around 11:00, Commander Martins Guerreiro delivered the MFA Programme here, as approved by the drafting committee. It would not be the official version: the text was changed that night, at the Pontinha command post, at a meeting with Generals António de Spínola and Costa Gomes.¹ The next day, in this same street, the people wrecked the premises of the newspaper A Época and those of the censorship office.⁶

A year later, the paper was at the centre of one of the crises of the revolution. On 19 May 1975, the workers’ coordinating committee, made up mainly of print workers, dismissed the editor, Raul Rego, the deputy editor, Vítor Direito, and the managing editor, João Gomes, accusing them of being mouthpieces of the PS. Rego and the journalists who supported him were prevented from leaving; there were clashes at the door, and people chanted “República belongs to the people, not to Moscow” (O República é do povo, não é de Moscovo). In the early hours, the Minister of Social Communication, Correia Jesuíno, ordered the typesetters to be evacuated, the journalists to be freed and the paper to be sealed. On 22 May, at a PS demonstration, Mário Soares said through a loudhailer: “25 April was made to end a dictatorship, not to impose another one on us” (o 25 de Abril foi feito para acabar com uma ditadura e não para nos vir impor outra).⁴

República came out again on 10 July, edited by a military officer, Colonel Pereira de Carvalho. That day the PS ministers resigned, and on the 16th those of the PPD; the ousted journalists founded the newspaper A Luta (The Struggle) on 25 August.⁴ República ceased publication in January 1976.⁵