The Republic of O'Equador (political brain teaser)

is a fake island nation I created to raise some questions on dealing with the 3rd World and de-colonisation.''
 * ''Note: The Republic of

Location
It is twice the size of all of Mauritius combined and lies on the junction of the Greenwich Meridian and the Equator.

Geology
The rich volcanic soils proved well suited to for

Pre-independence
The islands of O'Equador was uninhabited when the Portuguese arrived in 1475. The island was discovered by João de Santarém and Pêro Escobar. It was exsploered and thought to be good locations for bases to trade with the mainland.

The sugar industry started in 1502 the Prince of Portugal charged duties on the island's sugar crop.

Coffee and cocoa were introduced as new cash crops in the 1850 and soon extensive white run plantations (known as "roças") that soon smothered all the good farm land. By 1908, it had become one of the world's largest producer of cocoa. It remains to this day, the country's most important crop, alongside coffee.

Although Portugal officially abolished slavery in 1876, the roças system was often abused by land owners an the practice of forced paid labour continued.

The Pal Mall Gazette newspaper and Scientific American magazine revealed in in words and pictures the continued use of slaves in the March of 1897.

By the late 1950s, when other emerging nations across the African Continent demanded their independence, a small group of O'Equadorien dissidents joined the Movement for the Liberation of São Tomé and Príncipe (MLSTP), both of which eventually established its base in nearby Gabon.