A middle aged woman walks in front of the imposing portrait of Aime Cesaire mounted in front of the Fort-de-France Centre for the Performing Arts in Martinique.

She bows her head in homage and blows a kiss to the portrait.

She is one of thousands of Martiniquans who adore and respect Cesaire.

In the courtyard of the Centre, a group of young actors are shooting a film; the pictorial image of Cesaire will be central to the production.

Not far away, the headless statue of Empress Josephine, wife of Napoleon Bonaparte, has been removed for safe keeping. The statue will be reinstated when restoration work at La Savanne is completed. Then Josephine will emerge with a new ’head.’

By the end of this year Josephine, Victor Schoelcher-the Frenchman who was responsible for the abolition of slavery in Martinique-and Cesaire will stand tall among the people of Martinique, as three of the island’s national heroes.

One year after Aime Cesaire died, there is now a resurgence in Martinique to immortalise the man regarded as the Father of Negritude and also the Father of Fort de France.

Last month, France’s President Niocholas Sarkozy visited this island, changing the name of its airport from Fort-de-France airport to the Aime Cesaire International airport. When he died Sarkozy had praised Cesaire as ’ a great poet and humanist’.

Soon, the island’s largest centre for the performing arts and cultural activities in Fort de France will be opened and named after him. His literary works are currently being catalogued and will be made available for viewing at the this centre.

The office, library and all matters relating to Cesaire have been taken over by the Martiniquan government, and soon Cesaire promises to become one of the most important post-war figures, not only in Martinique, but also in the Caribbean.

A visitor to Martinique will see large photographs of Cesaire posted on walls and buildings; recognition comes from people in all walks of life and ethnicity.

Poet, playwright, and politician, Cesaire was easily one of the most influential authors from the French-speaking Caribbean. With Léopold Senghor and Léon Gontian Damas, he helped formulate the concept and movement of Négritude, defined as ’affirmation that one is black and proud of it’. Césaire’s thoughts about restoring the cultural identity of black Africans were first fully expressed in Cahier d’un retour au pays natal (Return to My Native Land), a mixture of poetry and poetic prose. The work celebrated the ancestral homelands of Africa and the Caribbean.

’Cesaire saw Negritude as a historical phenomenon that had evolved from the post colonial days, particularly the experience of the Atlantic slave ships and plantation slavery’ said Lionel Davidas, Professor of English Studies at the University of Schoelcher, the only university in Martinique.

He is confident that a new university will be built in honour of Cesaire.

’It is my understanding that there are plans in the making for a new university to be named after Cesaire,’ he said in an interview last week in the city of Trinite, Martinique during discussions held between representatives from San Fernando, T&T and that city on improving ties between the two places.

Trinite is the second largest city in Martinique and was twinned to San Fernando in June 1989.

In 1990, Davidas, on the invitation of the Friends of San Fernando, came to T&T to deliver a lecture on the life of Cesaire at the San Fernado City Hall.

Talking about Cesaire at the Hotel de Ville (City Hall) in Trinite, Davidas said Cesaire was so well loved by everybody in Martinique that ’when he died last year, it took several hours before his body was lowered into the grave at Lajoyau cemetery, Fort de France, because those involved in the funeral arrangements were hesitant to place the casket into the grave because they could not bear the loss of a man who had done so much for his people’.

He said after the funeral, the people of Martinique went into mourning for several months and even now some people believe that Cesaire is not dead.

’He was truly a man of the people’ said Laurence Lebeau, a leading member of the People’s Progressive Movement which was founded by Cesaire.

Cesaire died at age 95 after serving in various capacities, intellectually and politically.

Elected Mayor of Fort de France in 1945, he held that position until 2001.

He became a deputy in France’s National Assembly, where he served from 1946 until 1956 and from 1958 to 1993.

’Cesaire had dominated Martiniquan political life in the decades that followed his appointment to the French Parliament and had played a pivotal role in the formation policy of departmentalisation of the French outside territories,’ said Davidas.

- Louis B Homer recently returned from a lecture tour to Martinique that was sponsored by the Mayor of Trinite, Louis Joseph Manscour. Manscour is also a member of the French Parliament.