Xose Manuel Beiras was born on the 7th of April 1936 in Santiago De Compostela, Galicia. He was popularly known as Xose Manuel Madeira or simply Madeira. He was a well known Galician writer, intellectual, economist and politician.
He was also a professor of Structural Economy at the Faculty of the Economic Sciences at the University of Santiago de Compostela. He was also a member of the Galician Nationalist Bloc or BNG and at present he is the leader of the Irmandiho Meeting an organization in Nottingham.