Today is 12/10. Human rights day. A day we honored for many years. A day I will forever hold sacred.
No one has taught me more about what it means to fight for freedom, than the statesman who held himself with dignity, even until the very end.
The lessons he offered his country and continent, reverberate for our own today.
I am aware that our country can completely liberate herself from the chains of colonialism politically, economically and spiritually, only at the price of a relentless and sometimes dangerous struggle.
My faith will remain unshakeable. I know and I feel in my heart that sooner or later my people will rid themselves of all their enemies, both internal and external, and that they will rise as one man to say no to the degradation and shame of colonialism, and regain their dignity in the clear light of the sun.
Without dignity there is no liberty, without justice there is no dignity, and without independence there are no free people.
The colonialists have campaigned against me throughout the country because I am a revolutionary and demand the abolition of the colonial regime, which ignored our human dignity. They look upon me as a Communist because I refused to be bribed by the imperialists.
The day will come when history will speak. But it will not be the history which will be taught in Brussels, Paris, Washington or the United Nations. We will write our own history and in both north and south it will be a history of glory and dignity.
Neither brutality nor cruelty nor torture will ever bring me to ask for mercy, for I prefer to die with my head unbowed, my faith unshakeable and with profound trust in the destiny of my country, rather than live under subjection and disregard for sacred principles.
Rest in peace Patrice.
