Abdias Do Nascimento wins Franz de Castro Holzwarth Award
Elisa Larkin Nascimento
Source: Press Office

Text sent to the group list Rede do 3° Setor in 11/18/2005
http://br.groups.yahoo.com/group/3setor

Senator Abdias Nascimento is the winner of the Franz de Castro Holzwarth Human Rights Award for 2005, given by the São Paulo Chapter of the Brazilian Bar Association (OAB SP). The award will be delivered at a ceremony on Deceber 16, at 6:00 PM, at the OAB-SP headquarters at Praça da Sé, 385. Honorable Mentions will go to Padre Rosalvino Mouràn Viñayo and the NGO SOS Carentes (“SOS for the Needy”). The choice of the winners is by direct voting of chairman Fábio Romeu Canton Filho and all other members of the Human Rights Committee of the OAB SP.

In its 22nd year, the award once more does honor to one of the fiercest fighters for racial equality in Brazil, whether in the Negro Movement or in the Senate.
“Without doubt, the struggle to end racial discrimination has to be shared by all society, because only in this way will we be able to finish the harmful effects of racism and achieve effective racial democracy,” affirms OAB-SP president, Luiz Flávio Borges D´Urso.

The black activist Abdias do Nascimento was born on March 14, 1914, in Franca, in the interior of the state of São Paulo. Child of a pastry cook and shoemaker, Abdias studied economics at college and became known for his actions to valorize black culture and against racism. After first graduating with a certificate in bookkeeping from Ateneu Francano in 1929, he later moved to Rio de Janeiro, then the Federal District, where he received a BA in economics from Rio de Janeiro University in 1938. Also a dramatist, actor and director, Abdias was on of the founders of the Brazilian Negro Front in 1931, and created the Negro Experimental Theater (TEM) in 1944.

He is the author of various published books, among them Orixás, Drama para Negros e Prólogo para Brancos, Sortilégio and O Negro Revoltado, Sitiado em Lagos, among others. As an actor, he performed alongside Cacilda Becker in Shakespeare’s Othelo in 1946. He participated in the revolutions of 1930 and 1932 and was imprisoned in the 1940s for protest acts against racism in São Paulo. While in Carandiru Prison he created the Teatro do Sentenciado (“Inmates’ Theater”), one of the predecessors of TEN, which arose later. Abdias was one fo the organizers of the National Negro Convention, held for two years in Rio e and São Paulo and that proposes that racial discrimination be made a crime at the 1946 Constitutional Convention. He also participated as organizer of the first Brazilian Negro Congress, in 1950.

He concluded a course in sociology at the Instituto Superior de Estudos Brasileiros (ISEB) in1956. He also fought against the Estado Novo of Getulio Vargas and was forced into exile during the military dictatorship in 1968, moving to the United States. He returned ten years later and participated in the founding of the Unified Negro Movement of the Democratic Labor Party (PDT), besides creating the Institute of Afro-Brazilian Studies (Ipeafro).

He was Secretary for Defense and Promotion of Afro-Brazilian Populations of Rio de Janeiro in 1991, and was elected to the Federal Chamber of Deputies in 1983, and to the Senate in 1997. His actions in Congress were centered on support for the human and civil rights of Afro-Brazilians.

Seeking to bring more national attention to racial problems in Brazil, he proposed the creation of a Committee on Black Affairs in the Chamber of Deputies and was one of the leaders of the fight to obtain official recognition of January 20th as National Black Awareness Day, in commemoration of the death of Zumbi, the most famous leader of the communities of runaway slaves called qulombos.

He also introduced a bill to establish affirmative action mechanisms to help Afro-Brazilians after centuries of discrimination, which called for a quota system of 20% of positions in public service for Black women and 20% for Black men. The proposal also contained incentives for the private sector to hire more Afro-Brazilians, and incorporation of African and Afro-Brazilian studies in the national school curriculum. Additionally, he has been a strong defender of preservation and entitlement for remnant quilombo communities, and of the Pan-Africa movement, and of inclusion of Latin America in discussions of racism and the idea of racial democracy in South American countries.

He is also an honorary professor at New York State University and doutor honoris causa by the State of Rio de Janeiro.

The Franz de Castro Holzwarth Award was created on November 8, 1982 by the Human Rights Committee of the OAB-SP, to honor each year those who have stood out in support of human rights. The name Franz de Castro Holzwarth is in remembrance of the lawyer (enrolled with the OAB on July 14, 1968) who dedicated his life to helping the downtrodden, especially the incarcerated.

Past recipients of the Franz de Castro Human Rights Award are: José Gaspar Gonzaga Franceschini (1983), José Carlos Dias (84), Heleno Fragoso (85), Padre Agostinho Duarte de Oliveira (86), Paulo César Fonteles de Lima (in memoriam - 87), Ulisses Guimarães (88), Vanderlei Aparecido Borges (89), Fábio Konder Comparato (90), Maria Elilda dos Santos (91), Caco Barcelos (92), Herbert de Souza (Betinho - 94), Vicente Paulo da Silva (Vicentinho - 95), Dom Paulo Evaristo Arns (96), Rabbi Henry Sobel (97), Hélio Pereira Bicudo (98), André Franco Montoro (in memoriam - 99), PadreJúlio Lancellotti (2000), Dalmo de Abreu Dallari, Plínio de Arruda Sampaio and Ranulfo de Melo Freire (2001), Kenarik Boujikian Felippe (2003), Fermino Fecchio Filho (2004), Goffredo da Silva Telles Junior (2005).