In 2021, the first residents will move into their home on Tulastraat. Other chosen street names are the Thicopad, Janey Tetarypad, Virginia Graaipad and Bonipad. The five fought against colonial rule in Curaçao, Aruba and Suriname.
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The idea to name a street after Tula came in November last year from the Rotterdam resident Simão Miguel. He tipped the committees about it. A committee advice was later embraced by alderman Bert Wijbenga of Integration and Society.
Miguel is happy with the street names. “It is good that the colonial past is visible in Rotterdam. Not only the side of the victors but also the side of the people who fought against those rulers. These are real heroes who provided resistance. A source of inspiration for everyone in the city.”
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Amsterdam announced last year that it would name streets after people who have fought against colonialism and slavery in Indonesia, the Antilles and Suriname.
Mayor Femke Halsema announced this during Keti Koti, the annual commemoration of the slavery past. At that time she talked about the Surinam activists Otto and Hermina Huiswoud and the Curaçao writer Frank Martinus Arion.
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Who were the street name fighters?
Tula
Tula was the leader of the main rebellion of enslaved people in Curaçao. He and a group of fellow slaves started an uprising on August 17, 1795 at the Knip plantation, where he worked. In 2010, Tula was declared the national hero of Curaçao. Every year on August 17, the uprising is commemorated on Tula Day.
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In Suriname, Boni was the greatest resistance fighter during slavery. He was born in the jungle in 1730, the son of a runaway slave woman. He joined a group of freedom fighters and became one of the leaders of that group when he was an adult.
With that group he rebelled against colonial rule. For example, plantations were attacked. Women were liberated and supplies, tools and weapons were taken along. Finally, Boni was murdered in his sleep in 1793.
Thico
Thico was a slave-made man who had to work the land. He was a spokesman for the insurgents in Aruba. Together with about 30 other enslaved people, he turned against his ‘owner’ in 1795. He was shipped as a punishment. Eventually he had to work as a lugging slave in Fort Amsterdam.
Janey tetary
Janey Tetary arrived in India from 1880 on the Surinamese plantation Zorg en Hoop. She was a leader of protests against the working conditions of Hindustani contract workers on plantations.
Finally, in 1884, Tetary organized an uprising to fight for the promised payment and a dignified existence. That rebellion was crushed after two days, and the colonial government had Tetary and seven others put to death.
Virginia Graai
Virginia Dementricia, later Virginia Jay, is a symbol of resistance to slavery in Aruba. She was a enslaved woman who rebelled against her ‘owners’ in Aruba. After attempting to run away, jail and corporal punishment, she was sold in 1860.
The last thing known about her is that in 1867, after the abolition of slavery, she had a son: Marcelino Martis.
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