Tarrafal Camp
Also known as the “Camp of the Slow Death”, the Tarrafal camp was built by Portuguese dictator Antonio de Oliveira Salazar in 1933. Based on Santiago Island, the camp housed political prisoners and Africans rebelling against colonial rule in Cape Verde, Angola, and Guinea-Bissau, who were held here until Cape Verde won its independence in 1975, according to an article by World Monuments Watch. The camp, which contains a complex of prison cells, administrative facilities, and a small railway for the transport of supplies and fuel, has since been used as a military base, a refugee camp, a storage facility, and a school, the World Monuments Watch article added. In 2009, the Cape Verdean minister of Culture, Manuel Veigas, said the Tarrafal Concentration Camp should be transformed into a scientific study centre and a forum of culture for the African Portuguese Speaking Peoples. He believed that this was the only way to honour all those who suffered years of pain imposed by colonialism.
