Extract from Inkosi Albert Luthuli’s Speech to the SA Congress of Democrats (COD)
One might ask, “Is this vision of a democratic society in South Africa a realizable vision? Or is it merely a mirage?” I say, it is a realizable vision. For it is in the nature of man, to yearn and struggle for freedom. The germ of freedom is in every individual, in anyone who is a human being. In fact, the history of mankind is the history of man struggling and striving for freedom. Indeed, the very apex of human achievement is FREEDOM and not slavery. Every human being struggles to reach that apex.
It is sometimes suggested that people are “incited” to struggle for freedom. One wonders what that means. I admit that circumstances from time to time make it necessary to remind people of what lies at the apex. Naturally if I find a man in the mud, it is my duty to uplift him and remind him “You are not of the mud”. If there be human beings who, for some reason or other, have forgotten their rights and wallow in the mud, it is the duty of all who see, to say to them “Don`t wallow in mud. Try to reach up to the apex.” And the apex of human achievement and striving, as I have said, is FREEDOM.
…The yearning for freedom is not peculiar to South Africa. The whole of Africa is emerging into freedom. We live in the midst of what has rightly been described as “Emergent Africa”. Why should it be thought that Africans in this part of southern Africa are different from Africa
