If there is a country being talked and thought about by football fans in this country more than any other one at the moment, it is obviously Brazil.
That’s because the South American country is hosting the 2014 FIFA World Cup,and Ghana would be making its third consecutive appearance at the tournament which kicks off on Thursday, June 12.
A number of Ghanaian lovers of the game are looking forward to being in Brazil for the football fiesta but the trip would mean even more if the travelling fan is from Tabon in Accra.
The former World Featherweight Boxing Champion, Azumah Nelson, who is one of Ghana’s World Cup 2014 ambassadors, is from Tabon and has always proudly referred to his Brazilian ancestry.
History has it that between 3,000 and 8,000 former slaves transported from West Africa to Brazil, were returned to Accra in 1836 on a ship called S.S. Salisbury.
The slaves were said to have been transported from Bahia in Brazil to Africa after a revolt in 1835.
The then new arrivals were labelled as the Tabon people when they were heard replying ‘Ta Bom’ (I'm fine) to the Portuguese greeting of ‘Como Esta’ (how are you?).
Some of the slaves from Brazil were said to have settled in Nigeria, Togo and Benin. In Accra, their presence is visible in Jamestown, where the famous Brazil House stands on Brazil Lane.
In Ghana now, it is fairly common to find family names like Souza, Silva, Cardoso, Peregrino, Manuel, Gomez, Costa, Ribeiro, Nelson and Morton.
Others are De Souza, Palmares, Wellington, Benson, Azumah, Amorin, Da Costa, Santos, De Medeiros and Olympio.
All these names are said to have come with the slaves from Bahia in Brazil to West Africa in 1836.
A chat with a section of the Tabon community in Accra revealed that there is still a fond attachment to their Brazilian roots.
Though the Tabon people are integrated into the Ga ethnic group, aspects of their dances and songs, some of which contain Portuguese words, still reflect their Brazilian heritage.
One of the direct descendants of the Tabon returnees from Brazil is Chief Justice Theodora Georgina Wood.
Her great-grandfather, Mahama Nassau, was said to have arrived in the Gold Coast as the spiritual leader of the Muslims in his group. He was literate in Arabic and after getting settled, opened a Koranic school in his house.
In May 2008, Mrs Wood visited Brazil on the invitation of Justice Ellen Gracie, Brazil’s first female President of the Federal Supreme Court.
Boxer Azumah Nelson and Mrs Wood may be some of the Tabon high achievers in this contemporary time but some of their great-grandparents were also trailblazers in their own way.
In 1854, the Tabon were said to have become the founders of Scissors House, the first professional tailoring shop in this country.
Among the responsibilities and activities of the enterprise was the task of providing uniforms for the Ghana Army.
As the 2014 FIFA World Cup kicks off in Brazil next week, Ghana’s participation in the tournament would definitely remind the Tabon community in Accra and indeed the country of their special links with that South American country.
