The Chamber of Beja will declare on Tuesday a day of municipal mourning for the death of businessman Rui Nabeiro, representing an “almost irreparable loss,” the mayor of the municipality, Paulo Arsenio, told Lusa this Sunday.
“We have not declared municipal mourning yet, but we will do so tomorrow, Monday,” the mayor said, explaining that the day of municipal mourning in Beja would be “the day of the funeral on Tuesday.”
Paulo Arsenio justified his decision by the importance of the businessman Rui Nabeiro and the Nabeiro Group – Delta Cafés for the country and in particular for the Alentejo region, namely for Beja.
The mayor noted that “Delta has been [em Beja] an important commercial distribution warehouse for the Baixo Alentejo area and hence a major employer in the area.
In addition, he added, the company also sponsors several events in the region that Beja benefits from, such as the Ovibeja agricultural fair, “of which Delta is one of the main sponsors,” or Volta ao Alentejo in cycling. .
“For all this, for having an important trading warehouse here, for sponsoring various events in the region in which Beja benefits and takes an active part, we declare a day of municipal mourning,” he stressed.
As for the death of the businessman, this Sunday, at the age of 91, the mayor of Bej considered it an “almost irreparable loss.”
“All his life he was an example of how he turned a small land in the interior of the Alentejo”, Campo Mayor, in the Portalegre region, into an “absolutely exemplary” place, he stressed.
“And he created a company that employs a very large part of the local population and which also has a completely unusual public attention in terms of business life in general,” he continued.
Thus, Rui Nabeiro was “a loving man who always maintained a close relationship with his employees and, contrary to being the ‘establishment’ of companies, managed to do it all, managed to transform this small coffee division from the very beginning. 1960s in one of the largest Portuguese companies,” he said.
And, he added, “he did it from within the country, which is absolutely remarkable,” Paulo Arsenio also stressed, insisting that the businessman’s death represented a loss that “greatly impoverishes” Beja.
Businessman Rui Nabeiro died this Sunday at the da Luz hospital in Lisbon, where he had been hospitalized due to breathing problems.
Funeral ceremonies will take place at the main church of Campo Maior starting at 12:00 on Monday, followed by a memorial mass on Tuesday starting at the same time and in the same church, the family said. Then the funeral procession will proceed towards the city municipal cemetery.
Manuel Rui Azinhais Nabeiro was born in Campo Mayor, a village in the interior of the country, in the region of Portalegre, near the border with Spain, on March 28, 1931.